Security
by Petebuttah
Summary: Emily Fields has just left the army and found herself in the new job of private security. New York socialite Alison DiLaurentis is her client. It doesn't matter where you come from or who you are, everybody needs some security in their life.
1. Chapter 1

**Well hi there! This is my first story. I've enjoyed so many on this site over the years so I thought I'd give it a shot myself. Review, be honest, let me know what you think.**

Emily groaned as she stepped off what she believed to have been the longest flight of her life. She stretched and yawned, happy that she finally had room to do more than awkwardly shuffle while trying not to wake the passenger next to her. It had been 18 months since she had last set foot on US soil and a smile came to her lips as she realised that this would be her final homecoming. The military had served her well, she was greatful for all it had given her and that she had accomplished, but it was time to move on and her service had ended. With that thought she headed to the baggage claim.

She could barely contain her excitement as she headed through to arrivals, her eyes scanned the crowd eagerly until she heard her. A squeal pierced the air and people turned to look as Hanna Marin came flying toward her. "Oh my God I can't believe you're actually here! Is this real? You look great Em, seriously what did they feed you out there?" Emily just tightened her grip around her best friend. Sure they had face timed but nothing compared to actually holding the people you love in your arms and being able to speak in person. This was something Emily had learned early on in her service and it had certainly given her a different outlook on life and the people she wanted in hers.

"Easy there babe, let her breathe" Caleb gently peeled his fiancé off a beaming Emily.

"Sorry, I just really missed you Em"

"No complaints from over here" Emily grinned, honestly she couldn't think of a better way to be greeted.

"Come on let's go get the car and get you back to the apartment, you must be exhausted" Caleb said giving Emily an affectionate squeeze of the shoulder before picking up her bag and heading to the exit. Hanna linked her arm with Emily's and they followed with Hanna asking question after question. Emily laughed and rolled eyes, trying to answer them all before the next one left her lips.

Hanna and Caleb's apartment was beautiful and modern, a reflection of its owners. Hanna was working in fashion, something to do with choosing which lines would appear in New Yorks biggest department stores. She had face timed Emily a few months ago to tell her she had got the job and gushed about her new role, but Emily only managed to get the gist of it through Hanna's excited screams. Caleb worked in some kind of technical security. He had worked for a major company initially but had soon used his connections to branch out into freelance and now had some very high profile clients of his own. Which is how the conversation had started.

Hanna had gone to make them drinks when Caleb sat himself down next to Emily. "I understand you've only just got back but have you found a job yet? Or have any idea what you might want to do?"

"To be honest I've no idea, I guess I should have thought about it but I was more focused on getting myself home in one piece" Emily joked.

"How would you feel about private security?"

"I guess I would be open to it, why do you ask?"

"I have a client who I've been working with for some time. Have you heard of Kenneth DiLaurentis?"

Emily had heard of him, to be honest she couldn't imagine who hadn't. They were practically American royalty. He was a high profile business man who owned a lot of hotels and high end property. His family were constantly splashed over the front pages of tabloids and magazines, well they had been before she left and she didn't imagine much had changed.

"Yeah I know who he is" Emily said cautiously "I don't know anything about technicial security though"

"It wouldn't be a technical role. I was at his offices last week and he mentioned that he was looking for security for his daughter. The last guy had to be fired for making "inappropriate advances" he asked if I knew anyone in that area that he could trust, preferably a woman. I think he was joking about that part but I may have put you forward" Caleb looked at Emily awkwardly "I didn't want to assume anything, I just knew you were coming back and I didn't think it would hurt to ask you"

She knew who his daughter was, Alison DiLaurentis. New Yorks most famous socialite, she had a reputation in the press for being, well a bitch. However people seemed to love her anyway judging from the amount of attention she received and the amount of magazines Emily had seen her face on. To be honest Emily didn't really pay much attention, she didn't care for people like that so that's where her knowledge on the family ended.

Caleb noticed her hesitance "It would pay pretty well"

Deciding she had nothing to lose by speaking to Mr DiLaurentis Emily finally answered him.

"Sure, why not" She shrugged.

"Great" Caleb smiled "You have an interview with him tomorrow at 8am"

"You were that confident I'd say yes huh?"

"Say yes to what?" Hanna questioned coming in and handing them their drinks

"Caleb got me a job interview working security for Alison DiLaurentis" Emily replied accepting the glass.

"Oh my God! Alison DiLaurentis!" Hanna practically screamed "Why didn't you tell me you'd done that?!" She yelled at Caleb, excitement all over her face.

"That" He gestured at her response "Is exactly why"

Emily stared up at the grand building in front of her. Suddenly she was nervous. "Relax" she told herself "you've faced gunfire and the threat of bombs for the last 5 years, this is a walk in the park" She took a deep breath looking at her watch, 7:45am, then headed through the doors.

"I have a meeting at 8am with Mr DiLaurentis" she told the woman at the desk. She typed a few things into the computer in front of her before looking back up to Emily.

"Yes, please go up" She directed Emily to the elevators.

Emily walked over to the elevator before realising the woman had never told her the floor, it didn't matter there was a man waiting for her inside it that seemed to know exactly what she was there for. She stepped inside the the doors and took a deep breath, she was not a fan of elevators. Who wants to stand in an enclosed metal box when there's always the risk it could hurtle you to the ground toward your death.

"Morning" Emily greeted. The man in the dark suit merely nodded in reply and then looked away. Emily just stared at the doors waiting for them to open, deciding it was pointless to try and converse with him. Instead she just focused on breathing and hoping she would make it out alive.

Finally the doors opened and she rushed out into another reception area. The woman manning the pristine oak desk gave a cold smile. "Mr DiLaurentis will be with you shortly, take a seat"

She walked over to a leather chair and waited. After several minutes the cold woman spoke up again. "Mr DiLaurentis will see you now" Gesturing for Emily to go through the large double door that presumably led to his office.

She smiled warmly at the woman and gave a quick thanks but she had already gone back to her computer. "These people are arseholes" she thought to herself and proceeded to open the door.

"You were early, I like that. Time keeping is very important to me, but I assume you got that drilled into you in the army"

It wasn't a question from the man at the other end of the room facing away from her staring out of the floor to ceiling windows that made up the whole back wall. He turned to face her and walked over to his desk taking his seat and signalling for her to take the one in front of it.

"So Emily Catherine Fields, grew up in Rosewood Pennsylvania, studied at Pepperdine, served 5 years with a distinguished record and arrived in New York yesterday"

Again there were no questions so Emily just said "That is all correct"

He looked at her as though he were studying her intently "Everyone has a past Emily, everyone has done something they would rather not have come to light. My question is what's yours?"

Emily looked back confused "Excuse me?"

"I have had my best people looking into you, these people could find out if you didn't hand your homework in once when you were 13. Every other candidate they've found something, but you? Well you're as clean as whistle."

"There's nothing to tell" Emily simply stated "I just didn't have that exciting a life I guess"

"I like that, excitement usually leads to danger. I need my family to be safe." He continued to study her "Well, as I'm sure you've already gathered, I know all I need to know about you. I just like to meet the candidates as a formality. Somebody will be in touch"

That was it. Emily hadn't had many interviews in her life but this was without a doubt the strangest one. "Ok" she stuttered "well thank you for your time" she rose from her chair and headed out of the large door back to the dreaded elevator and the silent suit that occupied it.

"Hold the door!" Emily looked up to see Mr DiLaurentis marching briskly toward the elevator. "I have another meeting across the city, I'll see you out"

It was another silent ride and once again as soon as it was over Emily quickly headed out of the doors just after Mr DiLaurentis. She followed him through the main foyer and out of the main entrance where a large black town car was waiting at the curb for him. As he headed toward it Emily saw him. A man in black with his hood pulled up walking quickly toward him and reaching into his jacket. Emily sprung into action, instinct taking over. She reached Mr DiLaurentis in two quick strides grabbing him and putting him behind her shielding him, just as it hit. She looked up to see two burly security guards accosting the man as he yelled something about killing animals not being sport. Emily looked down at herself, she was covered in thick red paint and the remains of the water balloon that had been holding it were at her feet. Mr DiLaurentis didn't even look rattled.

"You're hired, my assistant will call you with the details later today"

With that he climbed into the car and was gone. Emily left standing on the pavement wondering what the hell just happened.

 **So yeah let me know what you think. This first chapter was obviously just to set the story up, do I bother continuing? Either way I hope you have a great day : )**


	2. Chapter 2

**Thank you for your kind words. Updates won't always be this quick but I thought I best try and get a real chapter out. Hope you enjoy. All feedback is welcome**.

By the time Emily had made it back to the apartment Mr DiLaurentis' assistant had already sent over all the details and documents. This ranged from salary, Caleb wasn't kidding when he said it would pay well, down to a pretty thick non-disclosure agreement. The latter had Emily face timing Spencer Hastings, one of her other high school best friends who had stayed a constant in her life. Spencer was a lawyer, everyone in her family was, and she was pretty damn good at it. After a serious study of the document Spencer gave Emily the go ahead to sign it. The hours would be long, ranging anywhere from 10 hour days onwards. Although some hours of the day she would not be required and other days she would not be needed at all. She had to be on call 24/7 but the benefits were pretty good. Emily figured she could stick it out for 6 months and be financially stable enough to get a pretty good apartment of her own and move on to other things. It wasn't that she didn't think she would like the job itself, and she was more than used to long unsociable hours. It was the thought of being at some stuck up, air head, bitch's beck and call that made her decide this was probably not going to be a long term thing. Life was too short to surround yourself with arseholes.

Emily found herself outside the large building she had her interview in at 9am the next morning. Wearing jeans, a white top and a leather jacket, the information pack told her to dress casual. Apparently Miss DiLaurentis didn't want the attention that suited bodyguards drew. 'People pay less attention to average looking people' the pack said 'you must blend unless stated otherwise'. She had arrived and been introduced to Miss DiLaurentis' driver, Carter. He was about as chatty as the suit in the elevator. Emily wondered if Mr DiLaurentis purposely hired unsociable mutes. It was while pondering that thought that Alison DiLaurentis made her appearance. She came strutting out of the building flanked by two suits, nose in the air. Now Emily had seen pictures of her before and there was no denying that she was a beautiful woman, but she had never seen her in person and those pictures did not do her justice. Yes she might be a stuck up bitch but she was a completely breathtaking one. All of a sudden she could understand why the world, with its obsession with beauty and looks, was obsessed with the woman walking toward her.

"You must be Fields" she stated coldly waving the two suits away.

"I am, it's a pleasure to meet you." Emily smiled politely and held out her hand.

"Of course it is" Alison replied not even looking at her and climbed inside the car as Carter closed the door after her.

"Maybe 3 months" Emily thought to herself, getting in round the other side, 6 was looking more difficult by the second.

The car ride was silent except for Alison's tapping on her phone that she hadn't taken her eyes off since she got in. They were going to some studio to do an interview and photo shoot for a magazine. Emily figured it would be an easy enough day, not necessarily pleasant, but easy. They finally arrived and Emily got out of the car coming round to Alison's side just as Carter was opening the door for her. She noticed that thank you didn't seem to be part of Alison's vocabulary, it bothered her. Raised by conservative parents with good values Emily had it drilled into her from an early age that manners cost nothing. Carter didn't seem to mind though, she assumed he was used to it.

"Shit!" Alison exclaimed as her phone dropped from her hand, hurtling down toward the hard pavement. Emily's reactions came quickly as she swooped and grabbed it out of the air before it could hit the tarmac. Straightening up she handed it back to Alison.

"Well that would have been inconvenient" Alison said as she took it off her.

"I think you mean thank you" Emily replied without thinking, quickly biting her tongue.

"Excuse me?" Alison looked at her for the first time that day since they had met outside the car. Her eyebrows raised and a cold look in her eyes.

"I errm…" Emily struggled

"It's your job" Alison scoffed "You get paid to do it don't you? You don't get thanks for doing your job" Putting a large pair of sunglasses on she turned from Emily and headed toward the studio.

Emily quickly followed cursing herself, maybe she wouldn't even be here for 3 months after all. She imagined Alison didn't take kindly to criticism and would probably be telling her that her services were no longer required by the end of the day. There were several paparazzi around but the security of the studio were keeping them at safe distance. Emily soon realised Alison's large sunglasses were to stop her being blinded by the many flashes constantly going off. Alison suddenly stopped to talk to a couple of "fans". Young girls that probably idolised the socialite. Emily kept her eye on the situation from a slight distance. The Alison that she had just been chastised by seemed to have disappeared and been replaced with a charming version. She spoke briefly with the girls. Giving them just enough to make them feel special and cementing their adoration, but not enough that they felt they were on her level. Emily smirked, she was good at this. No wonder she had everyone under her spell. She let them get a picture and then carried on into the studio.

They had been in the studio for 3 hours now. Alison had been through hair and makeup and had just finished up the photo shoot. She was a natural in front of the camera and other than a couple of comments reminding a low level assistant of their place when they arrived with a drink that wasn't what she'd asked for, she'd been quite pleasant. Emily was getting bored, nursing her second coffee of the day. There wasn't anything for her to do, she didn't think she could leave Alison and certainly didn't want to ask if that would be OK. She could only imagine the response. So she just sat and watched the spectacle in front of her. This was definitely not her world. Hanna would be in her element, she smiled to herself.

"Just the interview and we're done" A redheaded woman declared walking toward Alison "Please come and take a seat"

The questions seemed mundane to Emily, what's the beauty product you can't live without? What's your top fashion tip? What are your thoughts on bold lip colours? Emily wondered if they ever actually asked her about anything that mattered. She had a platform to do so much more than tell people how to get that perfect selfie. As she was wondering she suddenly saw a twinkle in the interviewers eye. It didn't look friendly.

"So are you seeing anyone?"

Alison just smiled politely "Oh you know I don't comment on that aspect of my life Liz"

"How are you coping after the drama you had with Elliot Rollins? I bet you're just a mess aren't you? It's understandable, what happened? Have you spoken to him since the trial?"

"I'm not here to talk about that" Emily heard the venom in her voice but she also saw something in Alison's eyes. Vulnerability? Fear?

"Come on it's just us girls, the readers are dying to know the details. The world is"

Emily saw the slight tremor in Alison's body and heard her voice catch in her throat as she started to speak again. Tears threatened the blonde beauty's eyes and Emily actually felt bad for her. She was there to protect Alison, that was her job. Providing security wasn't always about manhandling somebody so she did the only thing she could think off.

"What the fuck!" The redhead yelled as luke warm black coffee soaked into her white blouse.

"I am so sorry, I'm so clumsy sometimes, I tripped. You're probably going to need to get another shirt right? I just hope you got everything you needed for your article. I'm really sorry, send me the bill" Emily tried to sound sincere.

"I can't believe you just did that! You stupid bitch"

"Hey!" Alison's voice echoed through the room "You do not speak to my staff like that! We're done here" Rising from her chair she signalled Emily "we're going"

Emily followed her out, a little shocked at Alison's outburst. Apparently she was the only one that could speak to her staff like crap. They battled through the assembled photographers, the number had grown since they arrived, and toward the car where Carter was standing diligently with the door open.

The ride was silent once again. Alison kept clearing her throat and looking as though she was going to speak but then she would stare out the window or down at her hands. Emily decided to break the silence. Assuming that Alison was angry with her embarrassing the blonde with her "clumsiness".

"I'm sorry" Emily turned to Alison "It was an accident I…"

"Thank you" Alison said quietly.

"Excuse me?" Emily questioned.

"It wasn't an accident, you're not clumsy" She held up her phone as though it was a piece of evidence "Thank you"

"I was just doing my job" Emily dead panned and she swore she saw Alison smile and roll her eyes as she went to look back out the window.

The rest of the day was fairly uneventful, a shopping trip, adoring fans, a dinner with some other upper class snobs. Emily felt that Alison was less cold toward her. She wouldn't say she was being friendly by any means. She didn't talk to her, but she also didn't feel like she wouldn't have a job in the morning. They were heading back to Alison's place and then Emily was done for the day. It was around 8pm when they pulled up outside Alison's large townhouse. Not the longest day Emily had ever worked, definitely not the hardest.

"Carter will drop you home" Alison threw over her shoulder as she climbed out of the car.

"No it's fine, you get yourself home Carter. I only live a couple of blocks from here, I can walk it." Emily smiled at Carter who looked grateful. Judging from the ring on his left hand he had someone waiting for him.

"Suit yourself" Alison said as she headed toward the steps up to her door. Carter gunned the car down the road and Emily laughed to herself, happy the quiet man had someone he was that eager to get home to.

"Oh for fucks sake" Emily heard Alison snap.

"What's wrong?"

"The workmen have left all the goddam paint cans outside the door" She said throwing her hands up in the air.

"Do you want me to help you bring them in?" Emily questioned from the street.

"Yes" Alison said before letting herself into the house. Well it wasn't a please but she had got thank you earlier so baby steps she thought to herself as she climbed the steps to take the cans inside. It turned out Alison's version of "help" was Emily doing it all herself. She couldn't even say she was surprised.

"Right that's the last of them" Emily said bringing the final can in.

"Good" Alison replied reaching out for they can off Emily who handed it over. Alison evidently did not have a good grip of it though. As Emily let go Alison also seemed to let go, the can tipping toward Emily and the lid sliding off as Emily's white shirt suddenly became 'misty morning gray' according to the can.

"Shit!" Alison exclaimed and then stared wide eyed at Emily who was laughing uncontrollably while removing her jacket so it didn't get ruined.

Emily's laughter couldn't help but get a smile out of Alison who started laughing too "what's so funny?" She giggled.

"Just every time I meet a member of this family I end up covered in paint" Emily laughed trying to catch her breath "Just let me know if we're meeting up with your mum so I can put overalls on first yeah?"

Alison laughed hard "Yeah my father mentioned how you ended up with the job"

Emily couldn't help but notice how much softer and younger Alison looked when she laughed. She had a lovely laugh, lyrical and sweet.

"Let me get you another shirt" She turned and headed into the house leaving Emily who took the opportunity to look at her surroundings. It was a building site, she moved around the downstairs. No room was finished. Dust sheets covered every surface, she guessed it was a large piano in the corner of the living room from the shape under the sheet. It seemed strange to her, the woman who had everything or could at least get it, living like this. Alison arrived back with another shirt.

"Thank you" Emily said and she took the shirt "do you play?" She asked nodding over to the piano.

"Sometimes" Alison answered noncommittally "bathroom is down the hall"

When Emily came back Alison was in the half finished kitchen, Emily glanced around.

"Why don't you stay in one of the hotels?" She asked hoping she wasn't overstepping. Alison had been laughing with her moments ago but she was well aware that could change in seconds with the girls volatile temperament.

"I hate hotels" She answered simply "I spent my entire childhood in them, I have a home, I want to live in my home"

Feeling bolder Emily asked another question that had been on her mind since that morning, "do you enjoy doing those interviews and photo shoots? Answering question after question about your hair?"

"Would you?" Alison questioned back

"No"

Alison just shrugged as if to say, 'well there's your answer'

"So why do you do them?"

"People are going to write about me anyway, this way I get to choose the narrative" She almost looked sad "Well maybe today's wasn't a great example of that" she muttered reaching for a wine bottle and a glass. "Drink?" She asked, then clearly mistook Emily's shock for refusal.

"You best get yourself home, your boyfriend is probably wondering where you've got to"

Emily cocked her head "What makes you think I have a boyfriend?"

"Well no ring, you're not married or engaged but you seem the type to have someone"

"No boyfriend"

"Oh, I'm not often wrong about people. Must be having a bad day. Well I'm sure you'll find one before long"

"I really doubt that" Emily chuckled

"Why's that?"

"I'm gay"

"Oh" Alison looked at Emily. Emily always found people would react one of two ways when she told them her sexuality. Either just say ok and move on or they would start acting weird around her like they could catch it. She had an idea of which Alison would be which is why it surprised her when she said

"Well apparently I'm having a really bad day then. So do you want a glass or do you have a girlfriend waiting for you?"

"I'll take a glass"

"How did my fathers guys miss that one? The whole point of having a woman was that they wouldn't seduce me"

"Well I'm not in the closet. I've only had a couple of relationships but I guess I'm not on any social media so there's no evidence of them there. I just assumed he knew. He knew everything else. I certainly wasn't hiding it. Also for the record I have no plans to seduce you. Straight girls aren't my thing" Emily joked.

"You aren't on any social media at all?"

"Nope. I talk to the people I know and that's it. They're the only people's opinion that matters to me. Why do I care if some random person from some far flung part of the world that I will never meet likes my picture?" Emily replied, happy that Alison seemed more concerned about her internet habits than her dating ones. Alison didn't reply to that she just looked thoughtfully into the distance.

They sat in comfortable silence in the kitchen sipping their drinks. There was still a question Emily wanted to ask but she knew it was a step too far. The wine must have loosened Alison up somewhat though and she turned to Emily and said

"He was my fiancé"

"Pardon?"

"Rollins, the question you've wanted to ask me all night. I'm guessing you don't read magazines and gossip columns either"

"What happened?" Emily asked cautiously

"We met, he was older, worldly, came from a good family in England. So he had me believe, I suppose alarm bells should have started ringing when he wanted to keep us secret from my family. I mean I was all for a private relationship. I shouldn't have to share that part of my life with anyone else. Anyway he proposed a few months in, I said yes. That's when I decided I had to tell my father. By the time his guys had done their digging and we realised he was a con man he had already emptied my accounts. They caught up to him and he's where he belongs, that was a year ago, but people just love bringing him up" Finally a single tear broke the barrier and started its path down her face.

Emily didn't know what the hell possessed her to do it. Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was the vulnerable girl opening up to her. For a moment she didn't seem so scary and otherworldly and Emily leaned over and gently wiped the tear away with her thumb. This seemed to bring Alison back to reality as she pulled herself quickly away from Emily's touch.

"You should go, it's unprofessional for the staff to be drinking with me" She said coldly "I don't know what I was thinking" She rose from her seat leaving Emily startled.

"You know where the door is, see yourself out" With that she was gone.

Emily started the walk back to Hanna and Caleb's. For just a brief moment she had seen a different Alison. The question was, which was the real one? Just like Alison she didn't think she was wrong about people often either and she had an idea of the answer. Or was she just hoping?

 **Thoughts? Opinions? Good? Average? Stop writing at once? Whatever your outlook on this story I hope you've had a great day : )**


	3. Chapter 3

**Thank you all once again for your nice words. Hopefully I'll do you proud, if not, my bad.**

It had been a week since the moment in Alison's kitchen and you never would have known it had happened. Alison was back to being cold and ignoring, it bothered Emily more than it should have. She reasoned with herself that it was because she didn't believe it was the real Alison and she hated people being false. However evidence was to the contrary, one laughing fit and a brief vulnerable chat fuelled by alcohol didn't define a was it Spencer always said? Hope breeds eternal misery. She was aware of the blondes famous personality when she agreed to work for her so she shouldn't complain, but 6 months would have been made a whole lot easier if the working environment were a bit more pleasant.

However it was little moments over the last week that gave Emily hope for Alison. A fan with a small child had stopped them in the street, and while her usual balance of charming and aloof to the woman, she had interacted with the child so sweetly that Emily didn't believe for a second she was that good an actress. Once she caught Emily staring though she straightened up carried on down the street. Or when Carter finally spoke for the first time in Emily's presence, it was a simple good morning in reply to Emily's as he opened Alison's door. It had taken the brunette off guard and she quickly made a joke about him needing to quieten down and let somebody else speak for a change. Carter had smiled and blushed, Emily swore she heard Alison chuckle as she got in the car, however as she went to look at her the usual hard expression returned to her face. It was as though she didn't want anyone to know she might actually be nice.

It was Sunday and they were at yet another interview, this one with some internet fashion channel. Apparently socialites didn't ever have a day off, which surprised Emily as she didn't think they actually did anything. She had learned from her earlier mistakes and boredom and had taken to bringing a book or a newspaper whenever they went to these things. She was currently sat doing the crossword listening to Alison talk about some designers latest line. Emily was struggling, the clues were all cryptic style, she was missing over half of the answers and was moments away from giving up and going back to the articles.

"Ok that's great thanks, we'll take five minutes and then continue if that's alright?"

Everyone split off in separate directions to grab a drink and for Alison to get retouched. After a couple of minutes Emily heard the now familiar click of heels behind her. Then it stopped and she felt a breath on her shoulder. Alison stood silently, close behind her for a moment and Emily was just about to turn and ask if there was something she needed.

"Drawer"

Emily turned to look at her not realising she was quite as close as she was. She could see every detail in those stunning blue eyes. Why had she never noticed that smattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks? Something in her wanted to take her finger and trace them. Alison must have noticed her staring because she quickly stepped back and cleared her throat. Was it just Emily's imagination or was there a slight blush to her cheeks now?

"12 down, 6 letters. Sketcher went up to get reward. It's drawer."

Emily looked back down at her crossword, it fit. She wrote it in "How on earth did you get that?"

"It's cryptic, went up is usually code for reverse it and a sketcher is a drawer." Alison looked proud of herself.

"Wow, who knew you were such a geek?" Emily laughed and the pride on Alison's face disappeared and was replaced with a scowl.

"I don't do these stupid things, I have more important things to do than crosswords. It was a simple clue…" She began to rant.

"Woah I just meant that I'm impressed, you're pretty smart. You definitely shouldn't be defending that" Emily cut her off "Also for the record, crosswords aren't stupid and there's nothing wrong with enjoying them."

Alison opened her mouth to reply but was interrupted by the call that they were ready to start again. She went back over to continue her interview and Emily went back to her crossword. She felt eyes on her a few minutes later and glanced up to see they were Alison's. Emily threw her a smile, Alison looked away. Emily gave up on her crossword deciding she had other plans for it.

Carter was waiting by the car, Alison's door ready and waiting as usual as they left the building. Flashes went off around them as Emily guided them to the car. She had taken Alison's trick and started wearing sunglasses herself to stop the temporary blindness. As they reached the car and Alison climbed in Emily suddenly leaned down into her side of the vehicle before Carter could shut the door.

"I'm sorry, could you just hold these a second while I get in?" Handing Alison the newspaper and her pen before she could refuse. Then she straightened up and shut the door walking round to her side and climbed in without offering to take the items back.

The journey back to Alison's home was a silent one yet again. This time it didn't bother Emily at all though. She was enjoying watching Alison's furrowed brow as she worked out the clues and the look of glee on her face as she scribbled them in.

They arrived back at Alison's just as she placed the newspaper and pen into the middle seat.

"Thank you for holding it" Emily smiled "Get yourself home Carter, I'll walk from here."

Picking up the paper she got out of the car and walked round to open Alison's door so that Carter wouldn't have to get out. A system they'd started a few days ago. She looked down at the crossword to see it completed.

"Not bad for someone that doesn't have time for these stupid things. You're a natural." Emily joked as she opened the door for her.

"Shut up" Alison smirked and shoved Emily's arm playfully as she exited the vehicle.

Emily almost needed to sit down, did Alison DiLaurentis just engage in a joke with her? From the look on Carter's face in the front seat it had indeed happened. Emily mouthed "I know right!" At him and saw him laugh as he drove away. She was brought back to reality by the chime of Alison's phone.

"Eurgh! You just can't get the staff!" She growled while typing furiously.

"Gee, thanks" Emily quipped.

Alison looked up as if just realising she was still there at the bottom of her steps. Emily always waited for Alison to get in safely, but it wasn't as though the blonde ever waved goodbye so she probably never noticed.

"Not you, my dog walker"

"You have a dog?"

"Yes and he needs taking out, but the unreliable bitch that's meant to do it apparently has the flu."

Emily ignored Alison's description of what was probably a lovely woman and looked at her watch, 2pm. "I'll take him out if you want?"

Alison's head snapped up from her phone. "It's your half day."

"I am well aware."

"Why?"

"Because I always get half day on Sunday unless given prior notice due to an event" Emily kept a straight face knowing full well what the socialite meant.

"No I mean why do you want to walk my dog when you don't have to?"

"What can I say, I'm a sucker for a poodle and I have no other plans"

"I do not own a poodle" Alison scoffed " He's called Pepe, he's a sheltie, I've had him since I was a teenager, he's old and he's cuddly. He can be grumpy, he doesn't really like new people. He won't attack or anything, more like run away. He likes sticks but he won't play with balls. Oh and he's scared of birds" she finished.

"Is he a Sagittarius that likes long walks on the beach?"

Alison stared at her with raised eyebrows.

"Sorry, that was just quite the list, I said I wanted to walk him not date him" Emily grinned.

"Are you sure?"

"Positive, I'm only into humans. Plus you're my boss, think how awkward meeting the parents would be"

This time Alison didn't bite, instead she rolled her eyes and turned to the door "Come on then"

The first thing Emily noticed when she stepped into the house was that no more work had been done other than a bit of painting.

"Your workmen slacking off?"

"I don't let them in when I'm not here. I don't like strangers in my home, I'm doing a lot of it myself actually." She turned to see Emily's shocked face "What? You don't think I'm capable of putting paint on a wall?"

"I think you're more than capable, I just didn't think it was something you'd actually do"

Just then a fluffy creature appeared behind Alison's legs "I'll go get you his lead, he might not even go with you."

"Well aren't you just the most handsome thing" Emily cooed kneeling down and holding out her hand for Pepe to sniff as Alison left.

"Don't be offended, like I said he really doesn't like new…"

Alison stopped speaking as she walked back into the hallway and looked at the scene in front of her. Emily was laid on the floor with Pepe stretched out next to her, mouth hanging open in a doggy grin with his tongue hanging out. He was clearly enjoying the belly rub Emily was giving him.

"Seems friendly to me" Emily sat up only to have Pepe clamber onto her lap trying to get more attention.

Alison didn't say anything, she just stared. There seemed to be a warmth behind her eyes, Emily was yet to see her look at anything as affectionately as she looked at that dog. It gave her an idea.

"Come with us"

"What?"

"When was the last time you walked your own dog?"

"Are you saying I'm lazy?"

"Not at all! I mean I bet you'd want to right? If you could, I get that it's hard for you going out and stuff. I mean it's why you have me" Emily spluttered worrying that Alison was taking her idea the wrong way "You have me now, I mean I'm here, so why don't you come too? Shove some sweatpants on, put a baseball cap on your head. Nobody would even know it was you!"

Emily saw Alison's disgust at the thought of wearing sweats and a baseball cap in public. Then she looked back at Pepe thoughtfully. Emily almost had her sold she knew it.

"Imagine how much that tail is going to wag when he realises his favourite person is going with him?"

"What if somebody does realise it's me?"

"They won't"

"What if they do?"

"I'll deal with it"

They stood in silence a little longer, until Emily put her head next to Pepe's and they both looked up at Alison with puppy dog eyes.

"Fine!" Alison finally gave in "Just give me a minute to get changed."

Emily fist pumped the air and ruffled Pepe's fur. "Don't take too long!" She shouted after Alison.

When Alison emerged 5 minutes later Emily almost didn't recognise her. She'd changed into jeans and a baggy grey hoody. Her trademark golden curls were pulled back into a lose pony tail and she barely had any makeup on at all. Yet she looked just as stunning to Emily as she always did. She really was beautiful and Emily shifted uncomfortably on her feet as she felt things she was pretty sure she shouldn't be feeling about her boss. She'd always thought she was gorgeous, there was no denying that. However something about seeing her looking so normal and knowing that nobody else got to see her like this made Emily's heart beat a little faster. "Jesus, pull yourself together Fields" she mentally chastised herself and forced herself to look away.

"I know" Alison spoke up, dropping the baseball cap in her hand onto the floor "you're wondering how the hell I ended up on magazine covers. I bet you're wishing you'd never seen me like this" She laughed without mirth "I know I look disgusting, maybe this is a bad idea" she finished looking at the floor.

Emily couldn't believe this girl had no confidence, that she didn't know just how amazing she was. Further proof to Emily that Alison DiLaurentis was a character, an act. A security blanket. She slowly walked toward her and bent down to pick up the hat she had dropped. Standing back up she placed her finger gently under Alison's chin and tilted her head until she was looking in her eyes.

"Actually that's not what I was thinking at all" It was almost a whisper and she heard Alison's breath catch "Now put this on and let's go throw some sticks"

She smiled warmly placing the hat back into Alison's hand and turning toward the door walking over to it and opening it, Pepe's lead firmly in her hand. It was a moment before she realised she wasn't being followed. She turned back to see Alison still stood in the same spot, hat in hand and a blush on her cheeks.

"Come on! Before your dog pees in the house" Emily called breaking Alison out of her trance.

She quickly placed the cap on her head and followed Emily out of the door.

They walked to a small park nearby, Alison explained that it was private, for the surrounding residents only and that it should be quiet at that time as most of the dog walkers and Nannys would have left for the day. Emily had almost made a comment about people walking their own dogs and looking after their own children but she didn't want to make Alison defensive again. Not when felt she was finally getting to see the real her.

There was nobody else in the park when they arrived and Pepe was off his lead and eagerly chasing sticks as quickly as Emily and Alison could throw them and his old legs would allow.

"Where was he last week when I came in?" Emily asked, it was the first time either of them had mentioned the night Alison had let her walls slide down an inch.

"My brother went to the cape and I had a busy week so he took him"

"Are you and your brother close?"

"We don't hate each other"

Emily didn't quite know what to say to that, not knowing much about Alison's family, so she moved on.

"So you hate hotels, what else should I know about you?"

"What do you mean?" Alison looked at her with confusion.

"You said you didn't like hotels"

"No, I mean what do you mean what you should know?" Alison almost sounded accusing.

"Like, who's your best friend? What's your favourite colour? Pizza topping? Film? Song? Curse word? Book? Sexual position?"

"Fields!" Alison stared at her wide eyed and open mouthed.

"Relax, I was kidding!" Emily laughed and Alison's face returned to normal "I really don't care what you like on your pizza…"

"Fields!" Alison laughed too this time though, shoving Emily playfully like she had outside the car earlier.

"You like pushing me around don't you" Emily chuckled, exaggerating her stagger.

"Well I've found you like to push back" Alison replied, eyes narrowed, a smirk on her lips. They both knew she wasn't talking physically.

"Is that a problem?" Emily questioned stepping closer to Alison.

"It should be" Alison said suddenly serious.

"But it's not?" Emily moved closer still, they were almost toe to toe now forcing Alison to look up to see Emily's face from underneath the peak of her cap.

Alison cocked her head thoughtfully and she looked away, a flash of realisation across her face before bringing her eyes back to Emily's "No"

It was said so quietly that if Emily wasn't stood that close she wasn't sure she would have heard it.

"Actually I don't mind it at all" Again it was less than a whisper.

"Good" Emily whispered back, then brought her hand up to Alison's shoulder and pushed just hard enough to make her stagger.

The blonde let out a yelp which gained Pepe's attention and he left the bench he'd been sniffing and bounded over to find out what had his master making that noise.

"Attack, Pepe!" Alison ordered pointing at Emily. The old dog wagged his tail excitedly and jumped up at Alison trying to lick her face. Emily couldn't hold back her laughter.

"Not me!" Alison squealed as Pepe continued his assault on her.

"I knew he liked me better than you!" Emily teased.

"No you don't do you boy?" Alison bent down to Pepe wrapping her arms around him and burying her face in his fur, "you love your mama don't you?"

Alison looked so happy and the sight of such a carefree version of her warmed Emily's heart so much she couldn't even bring herself to make fun of the fact she'd called herself the dogs "mama". Then she saw a lone man enter the park, no dog, no kids. Maybe he was just out for stroll but Emily didn't like the feeling she got from him.

"Come on, we best head back" she said casually, not wanting to worry the woman that was currently whispering sweet nothings in her dogs ear.

Alison clipped Pepe's lead back on and followed Emily out of the park as they began the short walk back to Alison's.

They arrived back in good time and Emily stood at the bottom of the steps waiting to watch Alison go up them and in. Instead she turned to Emily.

"Yellow, just cheese, Love Actually, it changes all the time, fuck, and all the Harry Potters"

Emily looked at her confused.

"The questions you asked me" Alison explained.

"Oh I know, but you missed the most important one" Emily said placing a hand on Alison's shoulder.

"I am not discussing that with you!"

"I meant who's your best friend" Emily chuckled "Best friends are important"

"Oh" Alison blushed "Pepe I guess"

"Your dog is your best friend? I mean he's awesome but he's not very chatty"

"I don't really do friends, I mean I have people that I go to party's with and that I always see and speak to at events. I'm not a fan of the whole 'tell someone every part of your life and business' side of it. You can't trust people." Alison replied matter of factly.

"You can trust me"

"How do I know?"

"Well I signed a really hefty non-disclosure agreement so…"

Alison laughed, "Well that is true. What about you? What are your answers?"

"Well my favourite colour changes" she looked down into Alison's eyes, "Right now it's blue. I like as many toppings as you can fit on it, I love Die Hard, it's an oldie but a goodie. I have a very eclectic music taste so, like you, it changes. Great expectations. My best friend is Hanna Marin and she's amazing, we've been best friends since we were born pretty much. What else? Oh yeah, I like fuck too" She finished with a smile.

"Yeah you can't beat a good fuck.." Alison's hand flew up to her mouth as soon as it came out "I didn't…that's not what I…"

Emily howled enjoying watching the bright red girl struggle in front of her, "I thought you weren't discussing that with me?"

"That's not what I meant Fields and you know it!"

"I know, I know" Emily placated her, "so now we know everything that makes us friends"

"Friends?" Alison became serious again "you work for me"

"So get yourself a girl that can do both" Emily flipped her hair for effect and it managed to raise a slight smile from her boss.

"But…" Alison began

"Look the way I see it," Emily interrupted, "We are going to be working together for at least 6 months, we may as well enjoy each other's company. You don't have people you can trust, I have a contract that says you can trust me. I mean you could trust me without it, but I know you struggle with that concept. We get along, this afternoon proved that. Did you feel like you were hanging out with an employee? Even your best friend likes me." She gestured to Pepe who was laying at Alison's feet exhausted. " I'm not saying we have to braid each other's hair and have sleepovers but we could have actual conversations in the car."

She could see Alison mulling it over in front of her.

"Okay"

"Okay?"

"Yes, but it's a trial run. A week to see how it goes"

"I'll take it!" Emily grinned, happy at how the day turned out. She knew Alison wasn't a bitch really. These could be a really pleasant 6 months. So long as she stopped thinking about the kind of things she did when she mentioned a sleepover…on second thoughts this could be a very frustrating 6 months.

"Fields?"

She realised she had zoned out, "Sorry, one more thing"

"What's that?"

"If we're friends now we have to stop this whole Fields thing, it's Emily"

"Emily, okay Emily" Alison nodded.

"And I'm going to call you Alison"

"Wait a minute, I didn't agree to that" Alison shook her head vigorously.

"Friends don't call their friends Miss 'insert name here'" Emily reasoned.

"How is that going to look to people? To the other staff? To Carter?"

"Well when I'm working with you in a professional manner and there are ears about I will address you 'properly' When it's just us though it's Alison?"

Alison sighed "Fine, now let me get inside before somebody sees me like this"

Emily gave Pepe a scratch goodbye and watched as the two best friends ascended the stairs.

"See you in the morning Alison"

"Thank you for this afternoon"

"Careful there Alison, that's two thank you's in as many weeks" Emily smirked.

"I mean it" Alison said "I can't remember the last time I walked him, I had fun. Maybe we could do it again?"

"Whenever you want"

"Goodbye Fi..Emily"

The door shut and Emily started her walk home, spring in her step.

 **As usual all thoughts are appreciated good or bad. Have a great day : )**


	4. Chapter 4

**Thank you again for your many kind words. For some reason it's not showing the reviews but I've been getting them emailed so I have read and appreciated all of them. I'm rather blown away by the response and the amount of follows. You're all just rather lovely people : )**

 **So I didn't think I'd be getting another chapter out for a while but then I started writing tonight and this came out. Hope you enjoy, not going to lie, I felt this one got better towards the end.**

Alison's alarm went off at 7am as it did every morning. It took time and effort to look as good as she did. She swung her arm out of her duvet and stroked the furry head that she knew would be there "Good morning boy" Then pulled the rest of her out of bed to begin her routine.

As she showered she found her thoughts drifting to a certain brunette, the brunette had come into her thoughts a lot lately. For the last 3 weeks if she was being honest. Ever since she'd called her on her lack of manners Alison had paid a lot of attention to her. Alison had been embarrassed when Emily had basically told her off like a child, her reaction was defensive. The truth was nobody spoke to her like that. Well if her family didn't count, and she didn't count them. Then when she'd pulled that stunt with coffee to save her, well Alison suddenly felt guilty about the way she had spoken to her that morning. She had no reason to do that, most people would have seen it as karma, enjoying watching her suffer through that line of questioning. So when the interviewer had gone off at her she suddenly felt the need to protect the woman that had just protected her, hence her sudden outburst. Then when Alison had finally worked up the courage to thank her in the car she had made sly dig at her earlier rudeness but she didn't dwell on it or seem smug. She didn't make her feel like she owed her anything, this made Alison pay more attention. Nobody wanted nothing from her.

She got out of the shower and went to start on her hair. Her thoughts moving back to Emily. Emily who had laughed when Alison accidentally threw paint down her, she would have been furious, Emily just laughed. Her laugh was infectious, she couldn't help but laugh with her. She couldn't remember the last time she had laughed properly, she seemed to find herself laughing around her a lot. Something about her just brought joy. Shaking her head Alison thought about how stupid she'd been to offer her a drink. She wasn't sure what had made her do it. She just didn't want her to leave, she didn't know why. She didn't know why she answered her many questions, why she answered them honestly. Why she told her about Rollins. Something about the tanned girl made her feel safe to talk, to let her in. It wasn't until she felt her thumb gently stroking the tear away from her cheek that she remembered it was never safe, once again she acted badly.

When her hair was done she moved onto her makeup. She had tried to keep Emily at arms length after that. She remained cold, only speaking to her when necessary, but the funny brunette made it difficult to remain cold and unmoving. She was constantly making quips and jokes that made Alison smile or chuckle, not that she'd ever let her see that. So she stayed distant, until she saw her doing the crossword. Alison did the crossword every weekend without fail, she loved them. She loved puzzles and clues and solving the mystery, when all she ever seemed to talk about was makeup, clothes and Instagram it kept her brain working. That morning though she hadn't got her paper, so when she saw Emily pondering over it she couldn't help herself. She also couldn't help the way her heart beat a little faster and the blood rushed to her face when Emily turned to her, face so close she could feel her breath. It wasn't the proximity that caused those reactions, it was the way Emily looked at her, studied her face. She looked at her like she mattered. She'd noticed Emily staring at her sometimes, she knew she was gay, it didn't bother her. She was surprised at the information, she knew she shouldn't stereotype but she didn't 'look' gay. She never felt like she was staring at her in an objectifying way though, it wasn't like she was just looking at her, it was like she was really seeing her. The thought terrified her, made her feel far more vulnerable than if she was just checking her out. Then Emily had, she realised too late, paid her a compliment. Once again she acted badly, but Emily didn't let it slide, she never let it slide Alison mused. She'd got her told, not harshly, not meanly, just matter of fact. Alison knew what she was doing when she asked her to hold the paper and pen, she knew she wouldn't accept it if offered so she thoughtfully gave the girl an option she could comfortably take. She had felt the girls eyes on her most of the way back, not judging, not smug. It was like she was taking enjoyment in Alison's enjoyment. Even when she'd finally made a comment on their arrival it didn't feel mean, she was joking with Alison, not at her expense. That was when the last brick crumbled and she'd found herself joking back.

Putting the finishing touches to her outfit she headed down the stairs, Pepe at her heels. Emily's number one fan apparently. Who offers to walk their boss's dog on their day off? The same person who was sweet enough to make it possible for me to join them, to see that it would mean something to me Alison thought. That's where she made her thoughts stop, she didn't want to think about the way Emily had tilted her chin to meet her eyes and made her feel beautiful wearing sweats. Or the way her heart had sped up again in the park when Emily had stood so close to her she could feel her breath tickle her face. She was beautiful and funny and kind. That was it. She was easy to talk to and be with. She just admired her beauty, and now they were doing the 'friends' thing it was perfectly natural to be excited about seeing her today. That was definitely it.

She was startled out of her thoughts by the sound of the security system letting her know there was someone at the door. She looked at her phone, it was 9am, she wasn't being picked up until 10. She went to the system and clicked to see the camera. There stood Emily Fields, two coffees and a bag in her hands. It was almost as though she'd thought her into existence. Heading to the door she couldn't stop the smile that came to her face. She didn't even realise it was there until she opened the door.

"Wow, someone's happy to see me" Emily greeted.

Alison quickly recovered "This someone's excited to see breakfast"

"Ouch, you try to do something nice for a friend…" Emily feigned a hurt expression.

It had been a week since their trial started and it had gone better than Alison thought it would. It started with little things, actually greeting her in the morning and allowing herself to laugh at the amusing woman's comments. Throughout the week though it soon progressed to talking about her day during their many car journeys and complaining about the leery photographer. They had walked Pepe together everyday this week. She was amazed how easily they fell into the roles of Alison and Emily rather than Miss DiLaurentis and Fields. In fact it had started to bother her that they had to change roles at all. Like during a particularly boring lunch halfway through the week, when all Alison wanted to do was go sit with Emily and actually enjoy herself.

"Why are you here so early?" Alison's eyes shifted to Emily's left hand "What's in the bag?"

"It's nice to see you too" Emily dead panned

Alison just smiled sweetly at her, took the bag and headed to her kitchen.

"Bagels" Emily said following her in "Here's your coffee" She handed one to Alison.

"Thank you" Alison said, she had started making a conscious effort to be more polite around the brunette "but I'm pretty fussy about my coffee, I appreciate the thought though"

"Skinny vanilla latte with an extra shot, no whip, extra foam" Emily rattled off

"Well someone's been paying attention" Alison nodded her head, impressed. Why did she feel giddy at the thought of Emily paying enough attention to her to know her coffee order?

"Well it's kinda my job to notice things, I'd be pretty bad at keeping you safe from impending threats if I didn't even notice what coffee you drink every day"

With that sentence the giddiness faded. Alison took a sip of her coffee and went to grab them some plates.

"So you never said why you were here so early?"

"A couple of reasons. One, this is the last day of our trial and I wanted you to have no reason to end this friendship. Can't say no to a friend that brings breakfast" Emily wiggled her eyebrows playfully

Alison just rolled her eyes and sipped her coffee "What's the other reason?"

"Carter isn't able to work today, his father had a heart attack so he's had to go to Florida"

"Oh my god, is he ok? I should send something, do you have an address?" Concern lacing her voice.

She looked over at Emily to see her staring with a soft smile on her face and look in her eyes that Alison could have sworn was affection.

"As far as I know he's going to make it and your fathers office have already sent something according to your assistant that rang me this morning to let me know"

"Okay good"

"I didn't know you had an assistant, aren't they meant to follow you around all day, giving you everything you ask for and making sure the m&ms are all separated by colour?"

Alison laughed, "Pretty much" That was what her assistant seemed to do when she'd had one following her around. It didn't last long though, Alison found it irritated her too much and she didn't like having to spend that much time with the woman.

"So why have I never met Karen then?"

"We have an arrangement where she works from an office, organises my life and then just sends it to me electronically. If I need something I just message her and it appears. Trust me, we both prefer it"

Emily just nodded and took a bite from her bagel.

"So are you driving me today then?"

"I am"

"What about the party tonight? You were meant to have the night off, they've got their own security"

"Angelo is going to take you, whoever that is"

Angelo was her mothers driver, she didn't care much for him. To be honest she didn't care much for her mother, and if he was picking her up then it was looking like was going to have to spend some time with the woman tonight. She groaned inwardly at the thought.

The day went quickly, too quickly for Alison. She barely felt like she'd got to spend anytime with Emily at all. With Emily having to drive, Alison suddenly felt very alone in the back. Like something was missing. She'd overheard her on her hands free discussing her evening plans with a girl she presumed was Hanna. They were having a movie night by the sounds of things and Alison found herself wondering if Emily would ever have a movie night with her. Thoughts of being curled up on the couch with the brunette and popcorn were going through her mind, she shook herself. What the hell was wrong with her lately, this wasn't her. She wasn't a needy girl that imagined curling up with a friend watching films. She didn't even want anyone, never mind need them.

Alison's glam squad arrived not long after Emily dropped her off. The event was a birthday party for Noel Kahn, the son of a prominent New York judge. They were family friends so attendance wasn't optional her father had reminded her, before announcing that he wouldn't be going due to work commitments. Which meant it would just be her and her mother. She was listing in her head all the things she'd rather be doing that night when her phone chimed to say the car had arrived.

"You've put on weight"

"Hi to you too Mother" Alison smiled sarcastically as she climbed into the car.

"I'm just saying" Jessica DiLaurentis continued with pursed lips "Don't be surprised when the calls stop coming in."

Alison turned to look out of the window and pretended that the comment hadn't bothered her. The truth was it was all she could think about the entire journey. Such was her relationship with her mother. It was volatile at best, even when she did pay Alison a compliment it was back handed. Like the time she told her she was brave for trying to pull of that outfit with her figure. It was like every comment was designed to cut her down and hurt her. She had come to expect it by now, but it never made it hurt any less.

They arrived at the party without further comment on Alison's physical appearance. Angelo went to open Jessica's door first, holding out his hand to help her. Alison didn't miss the way her mother stroked the back of his hand with her thumb and the flirtatious smiles they were giving each other. Looked like her mother was back to fucking the help. Letting out a noise of disgust she opened her own door and climbed out. Ignoring her mothers calls to wait for her she stalked into the party, might as well get it over with. She figured she could show her face for an hour and then convince her mother they should leave. She didn't think that would be hard, knowing that she probably couldn't wait to drop Alison off and be alone with the sleazy driver.

"Alison!"

Hearing her name she turned to be faced with Mona Vanderwaal, the night was not improving. Mona was a fairly fresh face in terms of New York royalty. Her father had made a lot of money investing and when her mother had divorced him she took most of it. Moving them to New York and getting them on the scene. For some reason she had decided to make Alison her rival. Putting on her best false smile she tried to answer with the same enthusiasm.

"Mona! I should have known you'd be here. How are you?"

"Better than you, oh sweetie I bet you're just struggling through the days aren't you?" Mona's face had concern written all over it, her eyes however were filled with glee. "You know if you need someone to talk to I'm always here" She said putting her hand on Alison's arm and giving it a squeeze.

Yeah, always here to get gossip and take me down Alison thought.

"Thank you so much, but honestly I'm fine. It's been a year you know." Alison tried to be polite but Mona always made it so hard. "Oh I think I see the birthday boy. It was lovely to see you Mona."

She made her exit swiftly and headed over to Noel, only to be bumped into by a server.

"I'm sorry Miss"

Alison looked up at the sweaty middle aged man, "Look where you're going!" She snapped and carried on toward Noel. The quicker she could get through all the formalities the quicker she could leave.

It had been just over an hour since they'd arrived. She'd spoken to everyone she needed to, posed for all the pictures that would be on page six and now she was ready to leave. Seeking out her mother she found her in the bathroom.

"We've been here an hour can we leave?" Alison grumbled.

"You can leave if you want." Jessica replied, continuing to fix her make up without so much as a glance toward her daughter.

"I have to leave with you remember, I don't have a driver tonight."

"Oh, well then it looks like you're staying" Jessica said casually pouting into the mirror.

"Seriously? You want to stay?"

"This is why nobody likes you Alison. You're not fun, it's a party, enjoy yourself. God knows if there were an all you can eat buffet you'd be swinging from the chandeliers." Jessica laughed, amused by herself.

"Honestly I thought you'd be dying to get out of here mother. The driver isn't going to blow himself!"

She regretted it as soon as it left her mouth. Her mother turned on her.

"Listen here you little bitch, my life is not your concern. I don't know where you've got these ridiculous ideas from but you need to shut your mouth." Venom dripped from her mothers lips "I'm leaving, why don't you go see if they've cut the cake?"

Her mother sauntered out of the door leaving Alison stuck in place. A stall door opened and out stepped Mona, slow clapping with a dangerous look on her face.

"Bravo, what an excellent show" Mona held up her phone "The Internet is going to love it."

"Mona" Alison warned in a dangerous to

"No really it was fantastic. I'm not even going to sell it to the highest bidder because that, well that was just priceless." Cackling like a cartoon villain she too left Alison stood in the bathroom unable to move.

Her ride was gone and in the morning she was going to be facing a shit storm. Tears threatening her eyes she pulled out her phone.

"Hello?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't know who else to call."

Alison stayed in the bathroom until her phone rang.

"Hey they won't let me in, you're going to have to meet me outside. Go out the back, I'll be there."

"Okay, I'll be out in a second."

She left the bathroom and headed toward the back of the building to the service entrance. Pushing open the door the cold night air hit her and she shivered.

"Hey are you ok?" Emily said rushing toward her, "here put this on" she took her jacket off and helped Alison into it.

"Thank you for this, I'm sorry I just…I couldn't think of anyone else."

"Well I'm glad you thought of me, what the hell happened tonight?"

The tears that had been threatening to fall since she'd got in the car that night suddenly came bursting through. She just couldn't hold them in anymore and the flood gates were opened.

"My mother and then Mona and…" Alison brought her hands up to her face sobbing. She felt strong arms wrap around her and pull her in. Her face buried in Emily's chest she continued to sob. It lasted a few minutes before she took a deep breath and pulled herself together. Drawing her face away from Emily's chest she went to take a step back, but the tall brunette didn't let go.

"I got into an argument with my mom and it was bad. I said something I shouldn't have, I mean she said something first but I should have let it go and now…" The reality of the situation hit Alison again. "Oh my God tomorrow it's going to be bad, so fucking bad."

"People argue with their parents all the time Ali. Yeah you might not be friends tomorrow but it'll pass." Emily spoke in a reassuring tone.

Despite the situation she couldn't help but enjoy the way Emily called her Ali, nobody had ever called her Ali. She wouldn't let them, but she loved the way it sounded coming from Emily's mouth.

"No you don't understand." Alison stared Emily in the face trying to get the gravity of the situation across. "Mona filmed it, she got it all. Tomorrow it will be released to the press and it's going to cause so many problems. My father has only just started speaking to me again after the Rollins thing. It's my fault and I can't do anything about it." She started to sob again.

"The hell we can't" Emily growled letting go of Alison.

Then she started marching furiously toward the building fists clenched at her sides.

"Emily what are you doing?" Alison ran to catch up to her.

"I'm going to beat the shit out of this Mona!"

Alison had never seen the brunette so angry.

"Stop!" Alison called "you'll make things worse! There's a party going on in there, you really think nobody is going to bat an eye at you marching in and punching one of the guests?!"

"I don't give a fuck" Emily continued her march.

Alison finally reached her and grabbed her arm, Emily spun round. Her face was hard and threatening. It shook Alison and she quickly let go of her taking a step back.

Emily's face suddenly softened, realising what she'd done "I'm sorry I didn't mean to scare you" she reached out for Alison "Ali I would never hurt you."

Alison moved back towards her "I know, you just scared me for a moment that's all. I'm not used to seeing you like that."

Emily heard a noise and she turned toward it instinctively. One of the servers had snuck out the back for a cigarette, Emily squinted at him. He was familiar somehow.

"That's the arsehole that nearly knocked me down earlier." Alison muttered.

Emily put an arm round Alison guiding her away from the building, "Come on let's go, I've got a cab waiting."

"A cab?"

"Yeah, I don't have a car and I couldn't exactly run to the lot to get yours. I didn't think you'd take too kindly to me saying 'yeah I know you're having an emergency and all but I just need to nip across the city first' or are you that against cabs?"

Alison smiled to herself, there was the Emily she knew.

"I have nothing against cabs, I just assumed you had a car. I'm sorry for dragging you out."

"No place I'd rather be" Emily replied, giving her a squeeze with the arm wrapped around her.

Alison knew that she meant it.

They climbed into the cab, Emily giving the driver Alison's address. Her arm back around Alison, it felt nice. It made her feel safe, secure. Then she remembered why she was sat in the back of a cab with the brunette's arm around her shoulders.

"Hey it's me, no she's fine but I need a favour"

Alison turned to see Emily on the phone.

"I'm going to text you some details and I need you to remove something from their phone. Can you do that? Is that a thing? Awesome, I'll see you when I get home."

"Who was that?"

"Caleb, I need you to give me this Mona's details. He's going to take care of this."

"Really?" Alison felt hope flutter up inside her.

"Yeah, you'd be scared if you knew the stuff this guy could do. Right type it in." Emily handed Alison her phone.

By the time they'd arrived back at Alison's Emily had received a text from Caleb assuring her that it was all taken care of. Alison was elated. Emily had paid the driver and they were stood at the bottom of Alison's steps.

"I'm sorry I ruined your movie night."

"How did you know I was having a movie night?" Emily questioned.

"I overheard you on the phone earlier."

"Ah, well don't worry about it. This is what friends are for." Emily smiled down warmly at her.

"You could still have one if you want? I mean with me, if you wanted. You could come in and we could order a pizza and do that? You probably want to get home though so it's fine, really don't worry about it." Alison could hear herself rambling but she couldn't stop. What was wrong with her?

"That sounds perfect." Emily grinned pulling out her phone, "One cheese pizza coming up."

They were upstairs in Alison's room, the only room that was actually finished. Sat up on the bed, the pizza box between them, Love Actually playing on the large flatscreen mounted on the wall. Alison reached for the last slice.

"You sure can eat huh?" Emily remarked playfully.

The stinging comments of her mother came flooding back, she put the slice back and fought back the tears. Emily saw the sudden change.

"Hey woah, no that's a good thing. It was a compliment! I'm impressed. I mean I wish I could eat that much and still look like you."

That made Alison look at her.

"I mean it Ali, have you even seen yourself? You're gorgeous and sexy and beautiful and so stunning and.." Emily stopped and blushed, "Well you know what I mean" she looked down awkwardly rubbing the back of her neck.

Alison felt a warmth spread though her. She could tell Emily genuinely believed those things. That she really meant them. She picked the slice back up.

"So Ali huh?"

"Yeah, sorry it just kind of came naturally." Emily shrugged, "Is it a problem?"

"No," Alison replied, "it feels natural."

Emily cleared her throat "I'm glad you called me tonight. I know you don't have many people, but I want you to know you always have me."

"Why?" Alison turned to face her "Why are you so nice to me?"

"Because I'm your friend." Emily said it like it was the most simple answer in the world.

Alison had felt herself getting sleepy about halfway into the film but she finally gave in and laid down and closed her eyes, listening to the dialogue and Emily's gentle breathing beside her. It had been a terrible night, but now somehow she was the most content she could ever remember being. That was almost her last thought before she drifted off, but then a pair of soft lips met her forehead.

"Sweet dreams Ali"

She was wrong before. This was the most content she'd ever been, then she let sleep take her.

 **So there we have it. You know the drill by now, give me your thoughts, give me your opinions. If you have cake I'll happily take that too : ) Much love to you all.**


	5. Chapter 5

**You guys are seriously awesome! I never expected when I started this that I'd get this response. I have had the loveliest messages and reviews. I even got sent a cake all the way from the Philippines, well a picture of one, but it was still amazing : ) I really hope you continue to enjoy it.**

 **To answer a couple of your questions, Aria may well make an appearance at some point. To be honest I just start writing and what comes out comes out so I can't say I'm planning it, but it's always a possibility. I probably won't be exploring the other couples of the show. Sorry about that. Anyway I'll shut up now so you can get on with your day.**

Emily awoke the next morning to the sound of Hanna's tuneless singing. She groaned and covered her head with the pillow. Realising that her best friend wasn't going to stop murdering the classics anytime soon she gave in and got out of bed.

"Seriously Hanna? It's my day off, come on!" Emily complained as she stumbled into the kitchen where Hanna was making coffee.

"Well maybe you wouldn't be so tired if you hadn't been playing dirty stop out." Hanna replied sticking her tongue out. "What time did you roll in at? 2am? 3?"

"Somewhere in between." Emily yawned. Once Ali had fallen asleep she had just sat and watched the girl. Her face peaceful and worry free, she could have sat there all night. She had decided that she was being creepy though and left in the early hours leaving Ali a note to say goodbye and that she'd see her in a couple of days.

"That's so weird because I'm sure Caleb said you'd text him to say you were just dropping her off and then heading home, and that was around 10pm." Hanna narrowed her eyes accusingly "What were you two texting about anyway and why did you have to run out of here so quickly? What was the emergency and why did it require his help?"

"You know I can't say Hanna" Emily sighed, picking up Hanna's mug and taking a sip. "Eurgh, why would you ruin a perfectly good cup of coffee with milk and sugar?"

"Don't change the subject!" Hanna said with exasperation "I know you've got these 'fight club' contracts but it annoys me when I'm the only one out of the loop."

"Fight Club contracts?"

"Yeah you know, first rule of fight club, don't talk about fight club."

Emily couldn't help but laugh "It wasn't even anything exciting Hanna, it's dealt with now anyway."

"I know the time frame it was dealt with because I know when I got my guy's attention back. Which still begs the question, where were you?"

"We had a movie night." Emily shrugged getting up to make her own coffee.

"You had a movie night?"

"Yes"

"With Alison DiLaurentis?"

"Yes"

"You had a movie night with Alison DiLaurentis?" Hanna exaggerated every word.

"Yes!" Emily was finding her exhausting this morning. "We got back, it had been a rough night for her.."

"But you can't tell me why?" Hannah interrupted.

"No I can't tell you why." This time it was Emily's turn to exaggerate every word. "She needed a friend so we got pizza and watched a movie."

Emily continued to make her coffee getting lost in own thoughts. Remembering how Ali had felt in her arms as she sobbed, how nice it had felt to be able to put her arm around her in the cab. Then she also remembered how scared she had looked when Emily got mad, she cursed herself for ever making the blonde flinch away from her in fear. It wouldn't happen again she told herself. Instead she focused on how nice it had been to just hang out watching a movie with her. Finally she let her mind wonder to how soft her flawless skin had felt on her lips as she dared to kiss her goodnight. She started to hum, picking up her coffee and going to head the living room.

"Oh my God you're totally having an affair with her!" Hanna screamed, causing the sip of coffee Emily had just taken to come spurting back out of her mouth.

"What?! I am not!"

"Oh yeah? Well then why are you staring dreamily into the distance and humming then? Huh? I know that hum Emily!"

"I am not!" Emily defended. Suddenly very aware of the thoughts she'd just been having.

"Swear on my life?" Hanna challenged.

"Yes Hanna, I swear on your life." Emily replied softly.

"Okay, I believe you." Hanna conceded.

Emily visibly relaxed, glad the conversation was over and that Hanna would be heading to work. She loved the blonde dearly but she really didn't want to have this conversation right now. She went to head the living room again.

"But you want to, don't you?"

"For the love of God Hanna!"

"Admit it, you like her don't you?"

"Hanna, you're being crazy…"

"Don't lie to me Emily. I know you better than anyone, I know when you like someone. I'm not trying to start an argument here. It's just we always tell each other everything, but right now I feel like you're not telling me everything." Hanna spoke softly.

Emily sighed, "Do I think she's hot? Yes, but the whole world does. Do I like her as a person? Yes, she's great. The whole world would think that too if they got the chance to know the real her. Do we get along? Yes. Is she my boss? Yes. Would it be wildly inappropriate for me to cross that line? Hell yes! Not that it would happen anyway, because she's straight." Emily finished throwing her hand in the air, "Does that answer your questions?"

"Yes it does thank you." Hanna smiled at her warmly.

"Great, now I'm going to enjoy my coffee and my day off." Turning on her heel she again tried to make it to the living room, third times a charm she thought.

"You really like her." Hanna stated simply from behind her.

Carrying on her walk to the living room Emily raised her free hand, sticking up her middle finger as she went.

Emily sat with her fourth coffee of the morning. She was finally feeling more awake, she didn't want to waste her day off by sleeping all day so she had forced herself to stay up. She'd done her laundry, been for a run, even cleaned up the apartment. Now she was bored. Since her conversation that morning with Hanna, she had tried to keep herself busy and her thoughts away from a certain blonde. It wasn't working very well though. Everything she had said to Hanna was true. Now she was trying to work out if what Hanna had said to her was true. Every time her thoughts had entered into dangerous territory she'd always justified them. Everyone thought she was beautiful, everyone wanted to be near her. Friends cared about their friends. Did friends miss their friends like this after only 9 hours though? "Stop over thinking things." She said to herself, "nothing is ever going to happen anyway." Then she picked up her phone before she could stop herself and pressed call. She answered on the third ring.

"Hey, you want to take Pepe out?"

Emily arrived at Alison's about an hour later as she'd had to go pick up the car first. She bounded up the steps and pressed the button to let the blonde know she had arrived. Ali opened the door almost immediately, she was dressed ready to go in her usual hoody and baseball cap disguise.

"Hey, you ready to go?" Emily smiled.

"Hey!" She greeted brightly, "I'll just get Pepe."

The sheltie must have heard Emily's voice already as he came bounding past Alison and sat himself at Emily's feet looking up at her.

"Looks like he's ready too." Emily laughed giving him a scratch behind the ears.

"We're taking the car?"

"Yeah there's a nice park about an hours drive from here I thought we could go to. It's nice to walk around, I packed us a picnic."

"Sounds great." Alison said shutting the door behind her.

Emily got to the car and opened the Alison's door for her. The blonde instructed Pepe to get in and then shut it behind him before going and getting in the front passenger seat. Emily looked at her confused before getting in herself.

"You're riding up front?"

"Yeah, I can't talk to you properly from the back."

Emily just nodded at her logic and set off.

They reached the park in just over an hour, it was moderately busy but she managed to find somewhere to park. Ali got Pepe out of the back while Emily got the bag she had packed with the picnic in.

"Eat or walk first?" She asked the blonde.

"Eat, then we can walk it off."

"Good call." Emily replied and they set off to find a space to set up.

They managed to find a quiet space under a tree and Emily put down the blanket she had brought and started to put out the food.

"It's just a couple of sandwiches and a few snacks but it's all I could find at Hanna's. They tend to order in. Cooking isn't really her thing and thankfully for Caleb she's stopped trying." Emily chuckled.

"It's perfect." Alison sat down on the blanket and started to help herself.

"You didn't have any other plans today?" Emily questioned.

"No, I tend to use your days off to do emails and stuff like that. What about you? Nothing better to do on your day off?"

"I did my chores, went for a run. It was either this or Netflix and you're better company."

"Well thank you, I'm glad you called."

They sat in a comfortable silence while they ate, occasionally giving Pepe scraps.

"So tell me about yourself. I feel like I don't really know anything about you." Alison said turning to Emily.

"Nothing much to tell that you don't already know from reading my file." Emily shrugged.

"Okay, here's the game. We each take it in turn to ask a question, it can be anything and you have to answer honestly."

"Okay." Emily agreed.

"I'll go first, what are your parents like?"

"Wow, straight to it." Emily joked. "They're very nice people. My dad was in the army, he passed 5 years ago."

"I'm sorry to hear that." Alison said sympathetically.

"Yeah it was tough, it was what made me enlist when I graduated. My mom works for the local police department. They're pretty conservative, good values. Good people, I've never felt like I wasn't loved."

"That sounds nice." Alison looked into the distance wistfully.

"What happened with the last guy you had for security?"

"Wow, straight to it." Alison teased. "He was called Lorenzo, he was an ex-cop. He was always a little bit leery but I just used to ignore it. Then he started making inappropriate comments and I ignored them too. Then one day I was in a dressing room getting changed for a photo shoot and he came in, grabbed my ass and told me 'stop pretending you don't want it' I didn't ignore that. He was out of the door 2 minutes later."

Emily felt the rage bubbling up inside her. Her nostrils flared and she bunched her fists at her sides. How dare he touch her like that? How dare he talk to her in that way?

"Hey." Alison's soft voice broke her out of her angry thoughts. "He didn't do anything else, I dealt with it. It's fine." Then she reached over to take one of Emily's clenched fists. "I'm glad he did it anyway."

Emily stared at her, shock and confusion on her face.

"If he hadn't, I never would have met you."

She stroked her thumb over the back of Emily's fist, causing it to unclench and send tingles up Emily's arm and into places she didn't want to think about.

"Tell me about the army." Alison pulled her hand away and Emily immediately missed the contact.

"Well I served for 5 years, did a few tours. My last one just ended and I was discharged with honours."

"Did you like it?"

"Yeah, I guess. I mean it wasn't easy, you realise just how fucked up the world really is, but I had it better than most. I didn't lose any friends or ever get shot or anything. No PTSD or problems like that. I know people that did come back pretty messed up though and I thank my stars every day that I wasn't one of them. That was part of my decision to leave, I didn't want that for myself. The longer I stayed the more chance there was."

Alison just nodded.

"You ready to walk?" Emily asked.

At the word walk Pepe's head lifted excitedly, ears pricked.

"I think somebody definitely is." Alison laughed as Emily picked up Pepe's lead.

As they walked around Emily couldn't help but think about Lorenzo. She still felt a rage bubbling inside her at the mans actions. She couldn't help question if she was in the wrong too. It wasn't like her relationship with Ali was completely appropriate. She'd had many thoughts about the blonde that weren't exactly professional. Just then Ali linked her arm through Emily's and rested her head on her on her shoulder.

"Stop thinking about him Em."

Emily turned her head to plant a kiss on the top of Ali's as they continued walking. It was Alison that had linked her arm through hers, she thought. They were on the same page, they were just close friends. Very tactile close friends.

They walked around for about an hour before deciding to head back. They got back to the car and Ali put Pepe in to the back before climbing into the front again. Just as Emily was about to get in she caught a glimpse of someone out of the corner of her eye. It looked like the guy with the cigarette from last night, but before she could really tell he had his back to her and was walking away into the park. Putting it down to coincidence she climbed in and started the engine.

They were about halfway back when Ali said she was thirsty.

"I think there's a bottle of water left in the bag." Emily answered.

Alison undid he seatbelt to reach into the back for it.

"Hey what are you doing? Put that back on it's not safe!"

"Relax," Ali said retrieving the bag and pulling it into her lap before putting the belt back on, "I trust you."

"I trust me too." Emily replied as Ali searched through the bag. "It's the other arseholes on the road I don't."

"Great Expectations." Alison read from the front cover of the battered book she'd just pulled out of the bottom of her bag. "Did you think my company was going to be so boring you'd need a book?" She asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I didn't realise it was in there, that's the same bag I bring with me everyday. I always bring something to read at your oh so interesting photo shoots."

"This is your favourite right?"

"Well remembered. Yeah I started reading it again last week"

Alison started flicking through the the pages when Emily heard her laugh.

"What's so funny?"

"Their names, Pip, Mr Wopsle, Uncle Pumblechook. They all sound like stuffed animals."

"You can borrow it if you want."

"I've actually read it before, in school."

"What did you think?"

"I don't remember much of it." Alison continued flicking through until she found a page with a corner bent down, indicating where Emily was up to. "Can I read you some?"

Emily just smiled and nodded.

"I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be."

They were both silent for a moment. Then Alison spoke up.

"I remember now," she said quietly before looking at Emily, "Pip gets Estella in the end."

Then she turned back the book and continued to read aloud for the rest of the journey.

Emily dropped Alison home and returned the car before heading back to the apartment and hanging out with Hanna and Caleb. Hanna didn't bring up their earlier conversation and Emily was glad. She was more confused then ever and didn't want to be sorting through those feelings right now.

She was brought out of her peaceful slumber by the ringing of her phone. She checked the time, 2am. Looking at her phone she saw it was Ali, panic set in as she answered.

"Ali what's wrong?"

"There's someone here Em, at my house." Alison sounded terrified.

"Are they inside the house Ali?" Emily asked jumping out of bed and pulling jeans and her jacket on over the shorts and vest she'd been sleeping in.

"No, he's stood outside. He's been there for an hour. Just staring."

"Ali stay in your room, if he makes any move toward the house you call the police. You hear me?"

"Please come Em, I need you."

"I'm already on my way." Emily reassured the girl as headed out the door.

She sprinted the whole way there, figuring it was quicker than trying to find a cab at that time. She arrived at Alison's feeling like her lungs were going to explode. There was no sign of anyone outside the building. She pulled her phone out.

"Hey I'm here, let me in."

Alison practically jumped into her arms as she came through the door.

"It's alright," Emily soothed stroking her hair, "whoever it was they're gone."

"It was the server."

"What?" Emily asked pulling away to look at Ali's face.

"From the party, I kept looking out the window to see if he was still there and he looked up and saw me. That's when he left but I saw his face. It was definitely him."

Then something clicked in Emily's brain. It was him she saw today at the park, but she'd also seen him at another park.

"He was there the first time we walked Pepe, and he was there today."

"What?"

"I don't think it was a coincidence him working at that party, or bumping into you."

"What are you saying Em?"

"I'm saying you have a stalker Ali, and I should have realised it last night. If not then, I should have earlier today." Emily answered angry at herself. "I have one job, keep you safe and I've already fucked up."

"I'm okay Emily." Alison grabbed her face in both hands forcing her to look into her eyes. "Look at me, I'm okay. You haven't fucked anything up. You're here now and I'm safe."

"How long ago did he leave?"

"A few minutes maybe."

Emily headed toward the door, "Make sure it's locked and go back up to your room with Pepe."

"Where are you going?" Alison asked, panic in her voice.

"If he only left a few minutes ago I'll be able to catch up with him if he's on foot."

"No Emily." Alison's voice was firm as she grabbed her arm and pulled her back. "Call the police, they can find him. Your job is to keep me safe and I'm safe. You're here so I'm safe."

Emily stared into Ali's pleading eyes.

"Okay," she relented.

Alison's whole body seemed to relax, "Will you stay with me?"

"Of course."

Emily called the police and gave them all the information she had. They assured her they were sending units out to look now and would be in touch as soon as they found him.

"Well they're out looking for him, so we may as well get some sleep." Emily said walking into the kitchen where Alison was sat at the counter.

"The guest room isn't ready yet so…"

"It's fine, not a problem. I've had to sleep on the ground before now listening to bombs going off, a dust sheet covered couch sounds like luxury." Emily tried to smile but she was still uneasy about the guy being out there.

"No, I meant you can share my bed." Alison said quietly looking up at Emily.

Emily felt her throat dry up, "Honestly the couch is fine Ali." She managed to get out.

"Don't be silly, I've dragged you out in the middle of the night. Again. The least I can do is offer you a good nights sleep."

Emily doubted she would get much sleep but she nodded and followed Ali up the stairs.

"Do you need something to sleep in?" Alison asked her as they reached the bedroom.

"No, I'm good." Emily replied taking off her jacket and jeans to reveal her pyjamas.

"You didn't waste anytime getting here did you." Alison chuckled softly.

Emily shrugged, "Well I didn't think there was any time to waste."

It was then that she took in Ali's appearance for the first time since she'd arrived. She didn't have a bit of makeup on and she looked beautiful. She looked down at her sleep attire. All she was wearing was a white shirt, and presumably underwear. It was big on her, and covered her like a night shirt. It had a slight grey stain on the front of it. Alison saw Emily staring and looked down to see why, before looking back up and blushing.

"I forgot I had this on. It just got shoved in with my washing and I figured you wouldn't want it back what with the stain and all."

"So you turned it into pyjamas?" Emily smiled cocking her head to the side questioningly.

"It's comfy." Alison replied climbing into the bed.

Emily suddenly felt like the temperature in the room had risen about 50 degrees, and she was pretty sure it was due to Ali wearing her shirt. Her heart beat faster and she tried to look neutral as she climbed into the bed.

"Sweet dreams Ali."

She felt the bed shift and then the softest lips on her cheek.

"Goodnight Em, thank you."

Emily thought her heart was going to explode there and then. She hated when Hanna was right.

She was woken up by the light sneaking between the curtains. Opening her eyes, it took her a minute to realise where she was. Then another minute to realise there was another body tangled with her own. Alison was half on top of her, her leg resting in between Emily's, her head buried in the crook of her neck and one arm thrown across her body, fingers entwined with her own hand. Emily just decided this was the best dream she'd ever had and closed her eyes again to enjoy it.

 **So that's chapter 5. Good? Bad? Ugly? Your opinion matters. Have a great day : )**


	6. Chapter 6

**98 reviews! That's crazy! Sorry it's been longer than a day for an update, sadly that's going to happen sometimes. Probably a fair amount actually. The joys of being an adult, too much adulting to do and not enough hours in the day to sit writing about fictional characters. Such is life. Anyway wanted to get this up before I went to bed. Hope you enjoy it. It was a bit of a rush job in the end so I apologise in advance for any errors, if there are any my tired eyes aren't seeing them : )**

When Alison woke to find herself tangled up in Emily her first thought was how perfect it felt. Her second thought was that she really best untangle herself and move to her own side of the bed. That was about half an hour ago, she just couldn't bring herself to move. Then she started questioning why she didn't want to move. No matter what justifications she tried to make the same reason kept popping up, she liked Emily. A fact she was having some trouble comprehending. Emily was a girl, Alison didn't like girls. Sure she'd admired when one was pretty, she could appreciate when someone was beautiful regardless of their gender. This however was not that. No girl had ever made Alison feel butterflies in her stomach just by smiling at her. No girl had ever made her blush just by looking her in the eyes. No girl had made her feel like she might set on fire just because they'd touched her. She continued her list before realising she needed to stop saying no girl, because honestly no man had either. No, these things were uniquely Emily, and they all pointed to one obvious fact. Alison liked her. Deciding to just shut her brain off and enjoy the moment she closed her eyes again. She would give herself five more minutes and then she would move before the brunette woke up. Just then Emily's phone started ringing from across the room.

"Shit." She heard muttered into her hair, as Emily gently escaped from Alison's embrace to race across the room. Alison opened her eyes the tiniest fraction to see Emily quickly answer her phone while looking over at her to see if she was still asleep. She must not have been able to see that her eyes had opened at all, as she sighed a breath of relief before whispering hello and leaving the room.

She was awake too. Was all Alison could think, she was awake and she didn't move. The thought brought the biggest smile to her face as she stretched her muscles out. Then the smile faded. Her life was about to get very complicated. Either Emily liked her too and there was the risk of them crossing a line there was no coming back from. Or Emily didn't like her like that, she was being polite not moving her and no line would be crossed. She wasn't sure which one would be better, she knew exactly which one she wanted.

Just then Emily came back into the room, "You're awake."

Not ready to have to deal with the ramifications of finding out the answer to her internal questions just yet, Alison lied. "Yeah I just woke up, where have you been?"

"I got a phone call, I stepped out for a moment. Didn't want to wake you up."

"Was it the police?"

"No, they still haven't been in touch." Emily paused. "It was Paige."

"Your ex-girlfriend?" Alison tried to sound casual. They had spoken briefly about this particular ex of the brunette's while they were out walking Pepe one evening. Emily had received a text from her to say she might be coming to the city soon and that they should meet up. Alison had asked a few questions about her and decided that she didn't like her. Emily didn't say anything bad about her. Just that they had split up when Emily left to go overseas the first time, apparently Paige thought it would be easier if they broke up. Alison had thought she sounded like an idiot.

"Yeah," Emily replied, sounding a little uncomfortable. "She's in the city and wants to meet up later."

"Are you going to?" Again Alison tried to keep her voice unaffected. Internally she was seething. She chose to leave Emily, what gave her the right to just come running back now that things were 'easier'.

"Can you think of any reason that I shouldn't?" Emily continued to sound uncomfortable.

Yes! Alison wanted to say. Firstly the stupid bitch left you when you probably needed her the most. Secondly she only got back in touch with you when it suited her, and thirdly the thought of you being in the same room as her makes me so jealous I want to scratch her eyes out!

Instead she took a breath and continued trying to be passive about the whole situation, "No, if you want to meet her you should."

"Okay." Maybe Alison was wrong but Emily sounded almost sad. "Do you mind if I jump in your shower?"

"Not at all, go right ahead. There's clean towels in there." Alison smiled, confused. Had Emily wanted her to tell her not to go?

"Thanks." Emily smiled back, but it never quite reached her eyes.

While Emily was in the shower Alison messaged Karen to arrange to have the car delivered since Carter was still in Florida. She didn't want Emily to have to go get it just come back. She also asked her to send some clothes for the tall brunette, filling her in on the previous evenings events. Partly so that she could deal with any calls to the office about it incase of a leak in the police department, partly to explain why Emily had stayed the night. She didn't want anyone getting the wrong impression. Whatever the wrong impression was.

Emily appeared back in the room 15 minutes later wrapped in only a towel.

"I just realised I don't have any clean clothes."

"Karen is sending some over with the car." Alison replied not looking at Emily's face, instead she was following the journey of the drop of water currently making its way down the brunette's chest and toward to top of the towel with great interest.

Emily cleared her throat, "Any idea when they'll arrive?"

Alison's head shot up and she blushed, "Maybe another 20 minutes? You could dry your hair while you wait. My stuffs all in there." Alison pointed to a door near the back of her bedroom. "It's like a dressing room type thing. I'm going to go get in the shower." She managed to stutter out and then exited the room swiftly. What was that woman doing to her?

There was an air of awkwardness throughout the day after that. It was a day filled with polite chit chat and painful silences. Something had changed in that room this morning, and Alison blamed Paige. The police had been in touch to say that they still hadn't managed to locate the stalker. They didn't have much to go on besides the physical description and New York was a big city. The details that the company from the party had were false, so all they could do was hope that they got lucky. A patrol car would pass the house regularly and she was to document any other happenings. Other than that there wasn't much they could do.

The day wasn't a busy one and Emily dropped Alison home around 6pm.

"Do you want to come in for a drink?" Alison had questioned as she walked up her steps.

"I can't, sorry." Emily spoke from the bottom. "I'm meeting Paige."

A heavy silence hung between them.

"See you tomorrow then." Alison spoke without looking at the brunette and walked through the door.

Emily was not having a good day. It had started off great, waking up with Alison in her arms had been amazing. All good things must come to an end though and boy did they. She hadn't even looked to see who was calling when she'd answered the phone, more concerned that she had woken up the beautiful blonde she'd left in bed. Hearing Paige's voice on the other end had been a pretty big shock. She supposed she was stupid for thinking that Alison felt the same way, but a part of her had hoped that by saying she was meeting Paige the blonde would have reacted in some way. Given her some kind of signal that she shouldn't, but she didn't seem to care. Maybe Emily was off her game, maybe she'd read the signals wrong. She knows that she didn't misinterpret the way Alison stared at her when she got out of the shower though. Confused was an understatement.

Emily met Paige at a local bar, she had agreed to meet for a drink. It had been five years since she'd last seen her ex and she was a little nervous. Not because she was looking for anything to happen but because she was worried that Paige was. They had been together for two years though and she felt she owed it to their history to at least say hello in person.

"Hey!" Paige waved from the table she was sat at as Emily entered. "I got you a beer."

"Thanks." Emily said taking a seat. "How have you been?"

"Good thanks," Paige smiled. "I'm working as a scout for Pepperdine, and there's a kid in New York they want me to look at, so here I am."

Paige and Emily had both been on the swim team at the university and Emily knew that if her dreams of Olympic glory didn't work out she'd ends up coaching, or something related to the sport.

"That's great Paige, I'm happy you're doing something you love." Emily was genuinely happy for the girl. She wasn't a bad person, she deserved it.

"What about you? Rumour has it you've left the army."

"The rumours are true."

"What are you doing in New York then?" Paige leaned toward her.

Emily instinctively leaned back, "I'm working in private security."

Emily's body language wasn't missed by Paige and she frowned. "You working for anyone exciting?"

"Nobody you'd know." Emily replied, she didn't know why she didn't tell her about Alison. There was just nothing to be gained. It would only open up a conversation about the blonde that she didn't want to have.

"Fair enough. So what have you been up to?"

That's how the conversation continued for the rest of the night. It wasn't overly awkward, in fact at some points when they had reminisced about times gone by it was actually enjoyable.

After a few drinks and a fair amount of laughs Emily looked at her watch.

"It's getting late, I really should be going." She told the girl opposite her.

"I'm here until the end of next week, it would be great to do this again. I've missed you Em" Paige replied, reaching for Emily's hand across the table.

Emily automatically withdrew her hand. Paige used to call her Em all the time, but something about it sounded wrong now. Paige frowned again at Emily's reaction.

"Unless there's someone else?"

"No, there's nobody else." Emily lied. Well it wasn't technically a lie. There was somebody else, but that somebody wasn't hers.

"Okay great, well I'll text you then?" Paige beamed at her.

"Errm yeah sure."

"See you later Em."

"Bye Paige."

Paige had already text her by the time she'd got back to the apartment.

'Thanks for tonight Em, it was so good to see you. I had a great time XXX'

Emily had ignored it and gone to bed.

A few days had passed since she'd met with Paige and her ex had text her everyday. Things continued to be weird with Alison. Every time Emily's phone would ping she could see Alison bristle. She wanted to just confront her about it but she daren't, too afraid that the blonde would reject her completely. She had told herself that she wasn't going to waste her time chasing a straight girl and she was going to stick to her guns.

Carter was back from Florida, his father was making a full recovery and Emily was glad to have the quiet man here again.

Her phone went off again.

"Doesn't she know you have a job?" Alison snapped from the back. "Maybe you could tell 'Paige'," she said the name with venom, "that she needs to contact you out of work hours."

Emily looked at her phone, annoyed that Alison dare take that tone with her. "Actually, it's Aria."

Aria Montgomery, well technically Fitz but she had kept her name due to its reputation, was another high school friend. One of the 'fantastic four' as Hanna had dubbed them. The talented photographer was another constant in Emily's life.

"Oh." Was all Alison had to say for herself.

"She wants to know if me and Hanna want to meet up with her later, she's in town for a job."

"Right, well, I'm sure that will be nice." Then Alison went back to staring out of the window.

They arrived at the event they were to attend, it was a charity luncheon. Alison didn't seem thrilled about going, but Emily suspected that was probably due the fact that she'd be sat at a table with her mother.

They walked to the entrance, Emily keeping her distance as Alison posed for the cameras. To look at her you'd never know anything was wrong. Even when she greeted her mother the mask never slipped. It bothered Emily, she realised she'd never really know what the girl was thinking unless she actually wanted her to. Then she followed her into the venue.

*click* There was a bright flash.

"Em? What the hell are you doing here?"

Once Emily had regained her sight she took in the girl before her.

"Aria? Hey!" Checking that Alison was ok she rushed toward the tiny brunette to hug her.

"I know you're working private security now but I didn't realise you were working for her." Aria whispered into her ear as they embraced.

"Yeah, it's different." Emily offered with a shrug.

"Well this is the job I've got in town, which I'm sure you'd already deduced. I better go actually do it but hopefully we'll bump into each other again before tonight."

"Yeah, I best go do mine too." Emily gave a wave to the girl as she departed to take more pictures for the charity.

"She seems nice." Alison said as she walked back over, there was a genuine smile on her face.

"Yeah she's great." Emily smiled back.

"Alison!" Jessica DiLaurentis was stood impatiently waiting to enter the hall where they would be seated. "Must you do everything at the speed of the slug you seem to be trying to impersonate."

Emily growled, clenched her fists and moved toward the elder DiLaurentis.

"I'm sorry do you have a problem?" Jessica addressed Emily with a scowl.

"Actually…" Emily began.

"No." Alison interrupted standing in front of Emily and reaching back to place her hand on her fist. "Everything is fine, lets go in."

Then they continued into the hall, Emily following diligently behind staring daggers into the back of Jessica's head wishing she had punched her in the throat.

The luncheon went by slowly as far an Emily was concerned. The meal if you could call it that, Emily did not class food that covered 2 inches of your plate a meal, went on forever. Followed by rich people buying things they didn't need for extortionate amounts during the auction. Emily was stood off to the side, out of the way but in view of Alison and her table. She was bored out of her mind. At least it was for charity. Aria finally bumped into her again just as the last lots were being announced.

"You look like you're having a great time." She laughed at Emily's clearly miserable face.

"Oh yeah, just living the dream." Emily answered sarcastically.

"So, I know it's not my place but how long has 'this' been going on." She asked with a smile pointing at Alison and back to Emily again.

"What do you mean?"

"I get that you have to keep it a secret, but she's not exactly being subtle." Aria scoffed.

"Really, I don't know what you mean Aria. There's nothing going on." Emily crossed her arms over her chest.

"Well I just took a picture that begs to differ."

Aria turned her camera so that Emily could see the display screen. On it was a closeup of Alison. A soft smile gracing her face, and bright eyes full of affection. She looked beautiful, and happy.

Emily just looked at Aria with questioning eyes.

"I took that when she was staring at you Em, she's been doing it all afternoon."

Emily couldn't stop the feeling of happiness that swelled up inside of her. Noticing Emily's change in disposition, Aria spoke again.

"Maybe you should just tell her how you feel? It's pretty obvious to me she feels that same."

If only it were that simple, Emily thought. "Oh, Aria. Ever the romantic still I see."

"What can I say, it got me a husband." She joked. "Look I'll see you tonight ok?"

"Yeah." Emily replied with a smile, staring at Alison. "Hey Aria." She called as the photographer walked away.

"I'll send you a copy Em."

"Thanks."

She pulled out her phone and typed out a text and pressed send.

'Paige I'm really sorry if I gave you the wrong impression, but I lied to you before. There is someone else. Take care of yourself. Emily."

The car ride back was silent except for Alison's tapping on her phone. Emily couldn't take it any longer.

"Hey Ali."

"Hmm" She didn't look up.

"I text Paige."

"Good for you." Alison said coldly still not taking her eyes off her phone.

"I told her I couldn't see her anymore."

Alison's head shot up from her phone.

"You did?"

"Yeah, it just…it didn't feel right."

Alison smiled.

By the time Carter dropped them off it was early evening.

"What time are you meeting Aria and Hanna?"

"Not for a few hours."

"Do you want to come in for a bit?" Alison asked.

"Yeah, I really would." Emily smiled and followed Alison up the steps.

They were sat in the in the kitchen with a glass of wine each.

"I've missed you Em." Alison said

"I haven't been anywhere." Emily said simply.

"I'm sorry I've been such a bitch." Alison looked down at her glass.

"I think the real question is why have you been such a bitch?" Emily asked with raised eyebrows.

"Do we have to do this now?" Alison continued to stare at her glass.

"I think we have to do this eventually, might as well be now." Emily answered softly.

Alison finally looked up to meet her eyes. They stayed like that for a while, just staring. They were interrupted by a loud knock on the door. Pepe began barking loudly and growling.

"Wait here." Emily ordered before going to check the camera. "Holy shit."

There stood in a tuxedo with a bunch of roses in his hand was Alison's stalker.

"You have got to be fucking kidding me, this guy is a whack job."

"Em, who is it?" Alison asked coming up behind Emily, a shake in her voice.

"Ali go to your room with Pepe and call the police."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to answer the door, greet our guest and make sure he doesn't leave." Emily replied with a voice that was far calmer than she felt. She wasn't scared, she was just really fucking angry.

"Em, I don't think that's a good idea. What if he's dangerous?" Alison sounded terrified now.

"Well so am I." Emily growled. "I'm not taking the chance of losing this guy again, please just do as I asked Ali." She looked into Alison's eyes and placed a gentle hand on her cheek. "Please."

"Okay, but don't do anything stupid."

Well I fell for my boss, so it's a little late in the game for that Emily thought to herself.

Once Ali had gone upstairs and she'd heard the door shut she placed her gun into her waistband, opened the door and stepped out.

"Can I help you?" Emily asked once outside.

"I'm here to pick up Alison. We have a date."

"No, you don't. Why don't we just take a seat and talk?" Emily tried to speak softly to the unhinged man.

"You!" He suddenly shouted pointing at Emily, "You came between us! We were happy until you came! You ruined everything!"

"Hey man you need to calm down ok?" Emily said taking the mans arm and guiding him down the steps onto the street. Where the fuck were the police?

"GET OFF ME!" The man was hysterical now. "YOU! YOU DID THIS! YOU TURNED HER AGAINST ME!"

"You're not in your right mind, you need help. We can get you help." Emily continued to try and calm the man.

"AHHHH!"

He pulled out a knife and rushed Emily. She managed to grab the hand with knife and twisted sharply causing him to yelp and drop it with a clatter. However the momentum he was travelling with was too much and he plowed into her, tackling her down to the ground. She felt her back hit the concrete knocking the wind out her. He grabbed her hands and pinned them above her. 'Suck it up Fields' she told herself bringing her head up sharply to head butt her attacker, who fell onto his back groaning in pain. Jumping up to stand over him Emily drew her weapon and pointed it at him.

"Stay the fuck down!" She ordered.

"BITCH!" The man yelled, trying to get to his feet, one hand holding his head.

Emily placed a foot on his chest to push him back down.

"I said stay down! I do not want to shoot you, but I will if I have to!"

"You wouldn't do it." The man sneered.

"Try me arsehole!" Emily spat. "It wouldn't be my first time."

The next thing she knew they were surrounded by sirens and flashing lights.

Two officers rushed in and cuffed the guy, reading him his rights as they went.

"We'll take it from here, why don't you go get yourself patched up?" Another officer said to Emily and pointed toward the ambulance.

"Emily!"

Emily turned to see Alison flying toward her.

"Why aren't you in the house?" Emily asked angrily.

"Because you got attacked by a lunatic with a knife and you're bleeding from your head and I'm worried about you!" Alison replied equally as angry.

"Well!..." Emily didn't really have a reply to that.

"Come on let's get you sorted out." Alison place an arm around her waist and led her to the ambulance.

The paramedics said she had a few bruised ribs from where she fell and a superficial head wound. The skin had split slightly above her right eye where she'd struck the man with her head. It didn't need stitches, just cleaning. They'd offered to take her in to get checked over but she had declined, saying she'd sort it out herself. Then man had been checked over also and was now on his way for a psychiatric evaluation.

She was texting Hanna and Aria to tell them there had been an incident and she wouldn't be able to make it.

"Hold still!" Alison complained.

She had insisted on cleaning Emily's head, so she was currently sat on the chair in Alison's dressing room with the blonde leaning over her. She had suggested that the bathroom might be a better place, what with the blood and all, but Alison's response had been that the dressing room had 'better lighting'. Her remarks that she was cleaning a cut, not taking a selfie had been met with a hard stare. She relented, realising that Ali was not in a joking mood.

"I am!" Emily complained back.

"I can't believe you went out there!"

Alison had been doing this for the last twenty minutes since the police left.

"I had to. It's my job." Emily had tried to explain.

"It's your job to get into a fight with a crazy man with a knife?"

"Well…yeah." Emily had replied honestly.

"I just don't understand why you couldn't have just waited inside with me until the police arrived."

"Because he might have left if nobody answered the door." Emily felt like they'd been going round in circles for the entire conversation.

"Well that's a good thing, I didn't exactly want him sticking around."

"If he'd have gone, he'd have only come back another time. He'd still be out there. I couldn't lose him."

"Well maybe if you had, then YOU wouldn't be sat here bleeding!" Alison shouted this time.

"Exactly!" Emily shouted back.

"I don't even know what that means!" Alison had straightened up now, abandoning Emily's cut.

"It means that if I had lost him it might not be me sat here bleeding Ali! It means that he could have found another way to get to you when I wasn't there, like he did at that party! I couldn't lose him Ali because I can't lose you!" Emily finished her rant and waited for Alison to yell back.

Instead two hands took either side of her face and Ali's soft lips pressed gently against her own. Then they were gone. Emily's eyes flickered open to see Alison staring into them.

"This is a bad idea." Emily managed to whisper out.

"It is." Alison agreed.

Then her lips were back on Emily's again. Emily responded eagerly this time. She hungrily bit Ali's bottom lip, who let out the most intoxicating moan in response. Using it to her advantage she slipped her tongue inside. She tasted like what Emily imagined heaven would be like. Losing all control now she grabbed the blonde by the hips and pulled her until she was straddling Emily on the chair. Alison placed her hands in Emily's hair and pulled her closer, deepening the kiss.

Eventually, needing oxygen, they parted. Resting their foreheads together, both panting heavily.

"Best bad idea ever." Emily smirked.

"It is." Alison agreed.

 **So there we go. Looks like Aria did make an appearance, bless her. Hope you're still enjoying it, if you are let me know. If you're not, well let me know that too. Hope you're all having a great day. As always much love!**


	7. Chapter 7

**Well hello there! I'm sorry it's been so long in between chapters this time, but that annoying thing life got in the way. Thank you all for you lovely reviews, I can't believe how many there are! When I first started this story my expectations were pretty low, I'd have been thrilled with 10, so you can imagine how elated I am. I'm so happy you're enjoying the story, I apologise if that changes. Anyway here's your next chapter. Guest, whoever you are, this ones for your train ride to school : )**

When Alison had kissed Emily she was as surprised as the brunette. She didn't plan to do it, but the adrenaline that was still coursing through her from the nights events had given her the courage. When she had shouted that she couldn't lose her, Alison had realised that the reason she was so angry herself, was because she couldn't lose Emily either. So she had done it, she had taken the plunge and kissed the yelling woman sat in front of her. Alison DiLaurentis, the girl who didn't need or want anyone, both needed and wanted Emily Fields. The brunette had been right, this was a terrible idea. It was stupid and reckless and everything else her parents would say if they knew. Right now though Alison couldn't care less, because as Emily's tongue danced against her own and the tanned beauty's strong hands gripped her waist, she never wanted another day to pass where she didn't get to kiss Emily Fields.

She wasn't sure if it was minutes or hours that had passed since they started their heavy make out session. They were in their own little bubble, one she could happily stay in forever. However Emily broke away to speak.

"Ali," Emily breathed out pulling away from her lips, only to begin trailing kisses along her jawline to her neck, "we need to stop."

"Why?" Alison mumbled out, tilting her head back to give her better access.

"Because," Emily continued to place soft kisses on the sensitive skin sending tingles shooting throughout Alison's entire body, "if we don't stop now, then I'm not sure that we will at all."

"Sounds good to me." She couldn't suppress the moan that escaped when the brunette gently sucked on her pulse point.

Emily pulled away completely.

"No, not like this." She stated gently, taking Alison's face in her hands and stroking her thumb softly against her cheek. "I want to do this right. It's been a crazy night and I don't want you doing something you're going to regret."

"I regret nothing." Alison replied honestly.

"Then let's keep it that way." Emily leaned forward to kiss her softly once more. "Come on, time for bed."

"I thought you just said…" Alison smirked, raising an eyebrow.

"To sleep." Emily laughed, moving to stand, forcing Alison to climb off her lap.

Alison found something for Emily to sleep in and headed to the bathroom to get herself ready for bed. She returned to the room to see Emily already underneath the sheets, laid on her back passed out. Smiling at the sight, she turned off the light and climbed in next to her.

"I know I didn't say it before when I was shouting at you, but thank you for keeping me safe." She carefully leaned over and placed a tender kiss on Emily's cut. Then turned over and closed her eyes.

"Always." She heard from behind her. Then she felt Emily turn on her side, planting a delicate kiss on Ali's shoulder.

Alison reached behind her and took Emily's arm, wrapping it around her middle and holding it there, lacing their fingers together.

"Goodnight Em."

"Sweet dreams Ali."

When Alison woke the next morning Emily's strong arm was not around her. She rolled over to see that she was no longer in bed at all.

"Em?" She called out, voice raspy from sleep.

When she didn't get a reply she began to panic. Maybe this wasn't what Emily wanted at all. She had practically thrown herself at the brunette, was it too much? Had she got up in the night and left? Her thoughts racing she started to climb out of bed, maybe she'd left a note.

"Don't get up, I wanted to surprise you."

She turned her eyes to the door, Emily was stood with a tray.

"Breakfast in bed." She stated with a smile. "Not that you had anything in to make a good breakfast," she rolled her eyes, "so I hope toast and tea will do."

Alison felt relief throughout her whole body. "It's perfect."

They sat in bed together eating the humble breakfast that Emily had prepared, watching the morning news. The domesticity of it all wasn't lost on Alison. She had never done this with anyone, not even Elliot. He'd had to travel a lot for 'work', at least that's how he explained his frequent absences and reasons for not staying over. Suddenly she was hit with a wave of worry, what were they doing? Yesterday Emily was just her employee, now they were spooning at night and eating breakfast in bed. She looked over to the brunette who was awkwardly trying to wipe crumbs off her top and onto her plate. She looked up at Alison sheepishly.

"Sorry, think I got some in your bed."

Alison's worry dissipated somewhat. Sure she didn't know what the hell they were doing, but whatever it was, she wanted to do it with the funny, sweet brunette next to her regardless.

"It's ok, Martha will change the sheets today anyway." She smiled.

"Martha?" Emily asked.

"My cleaner, she's worked for the family since I was little. She's pretty much the only person I'll let in the house while I'm not here. I don't know what I'm going to do when she retires, to be honest I think she's only still working because she knows I won't hire anyone else and the house will go to shit." Alison laughed.

"Poor Martha." Emily replied with a sad, exaggerated shake of her head. "Maybe you'll actually have to learn to clean up after yourself."

"Like poor people?" Alison joked.

Emily nodded, keeping a straight face. "Yes, just like poor people."

"No, I think I'll just have my security add it to their responsibilities." Alison smirked.

"Well I think you'll be looking for a new cleaner and new security then." Emily replied taking a sip of her tea.

"Hmm, maybe that's not a bad idea." Alison put her hand to her chin pretending to think.

"Hey!" Emily pouted.

Alison began to laugh, "You started it!"

They were interrupted by the door. Emily went to check the camera to see it was the police. She quickly got dressed and went to answer while Alison got herself sorted.

When Alison got downstairs two detectives were sat in the kitchen with Emily.

"Miss DiLaurentis." One of them greeted.

"Good morning, sorry I took a minute to come down, I wasn't expecting you." She apologised.

"It's fine, we just wanted to keep you informed of the progress made in the investigation."

"What have you found out?" She wanted to walk over to Emily's side, just to be near her, but she didn't want the detectives to see that. So she remained standing where she was.

"The mans name is Paul Stevens, does the name mean anything to you?"

Alison shook her head, she'd never heard the name in her life.

"We just have to ask, he believes that he's been in contact with you for the last six months."

"I can assure you that I've never had any contact with that man. Other than him bumping into me at Noel Kahn's party, that was the first I've ever seen of him." Alison replied.

"Yes, well he believes you've been sending him messages through the newspaper, magazines, your interviews, things like that."

"That's absurd." Alison said, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Believe it or not, it's not the first case of its kind." The detective sighed. "He's been placed inside a secure psychiatric facility for treatment. You may be called upon at some time for testimony, but it's not likely. It doesn't look like he's contesting the court order. We just wanted to let you know."

"Well thank you, I appreciate you taking the time." Alison replied.

"We'll be off then."

The detectives got up and Emily began walking them to the door.

"Actually Miss DiLaurentis," The detective that hadn't spoken turned to her looking embarrassed. "My girlfriend is a huge fan of yours, do you think I could get a picture?"

"Are you serious right now?" Emily spoke up with disbelief.

"I'm sorry." The detective stuttered out, obviously regretting his request. "That's very inappropriate of me."

"You think?" Emily stared at him hard, arms across her chest.

"It was nice to meet you." He called out as they left.

"What the fuck was that?!" Emily turned to Alison, "Can I get a picture? Of course it's inappropriate. Who does that?"

"I'm going to get in the shower." Alison said, heading toward the stairs.

"That didn't bother you?" Emily asked as she was leaving.

"I'm used to it." Alison shrugged, "Plus I really don't think you can be lecturing other people on 'appropriate' behaviour with me." She laughed as she ascended the stairs.

"Got me there." Emily shouted after her.

Carter arrived to pick them up at 10am. She didn't have any appointments that day but she wanted to go shopping for pieces for her winter wardrobe. God forbid she be seen in the same outfit twice. The magazines would never let that slide.

Once they were sat in the back and on their way Alison became very aware of Carter's presence. Something she'd never even thought of before. What if he knew? Would he be able to tell? Paranoid that she'd let the development in her and Emily's relationship show somehow, she ignored the brunette for the entire journey.

"Ali?" Emily tried to get her attention.

Alison shot her a look. "Miss DiLaurentis." She whispered angrily.

"Sorry, Miss DiLaurentis." Emily rolled her eyes, "Is everything alright?"

"Yes," Alison replied coldly, "Everything is fine."

Emily stared at her for a few seconds and then turned to look out of her own window.

They'd been shopping for a few hours and Alison could see Emily growing bored. When she had first started working for her she couldn't have cared less. In fact she wouldn't have even noticed, but things were different now. She noticed everything about Emily now, and she cared. She cared that the brunette was bored and this made things complicated. On one hand it was her job, she worked for Alison and it didn't matter that she didn't find this entertaining. On the other though, Alison wanted her friend, her, whatever this was, to be happy.

She was in the changing room trying on yet another dress, yes it wasn't exactly suitable for winter, but she liked it. She was having trouble with the zipper, so she called to Emily, who was standing outside the door, to come help her.

"What do you need Miss DiLaurentis." Emily asked, emphasising her name.

"Look I'm not going to apologise about the car. We agreed weeks ago that when there were ears about we'd keep it professional." Alison sighed.

"I know, you're right." Emily conceded. "It's just, hard, that's all."

"I know but we need to be careful Em, it won't just be me that gets wrung through the press if this gets out. They'll be after you too." Alison tried to explain.

"I know, I know." Emily stepped toward her, putting her hands on Alison's shoulders.

"Zip me up?" Alison turned to look in the mirror as Emily slowly pulled the zipper up, before leaning down and softly kissing her shoulder.

Alison spun around, "What are you doing?!"

"Nothing, I just..." Emily started to reply.

"You just what?" Alison asked, anger in her tone. "We're in public, anyone could be watching."

"I'll be outside." Emily turned and left.

Fuck! Alison knew she had overreacted, Emily was just being her usual sweet self. Alison couldn't stop herself though, she was always on guard in public. She had to be, people were just waiting for her to mess up, to get a juicy story out of her. This was a changing room though, there weren't cameras in here, she doubted it was a two way mirror. She had messed up, and the only person that had been there to see it was Emily. Preparing herself for an apology she opened the door to see Emily laughing with some woman. Emily noticed her appearance and looked uncomfortable.

"Miss DiLaurentis," she cleared her throat, "This is Paige McCullers, Paige this is my boss." She introduced.

Alison stood silently for a moment in shock. She didn't like unwelcome surprises, and this one was very unwelcome. Quickly regaining her composure she greeted Emily's ex.

"Hello." She couldn't help but sound like a bitch, she really didn't like this girl.

"Hello." Judging from the other girls tone she didn't much care for Alison either. Fine by her.

"Fields, it's time we left." Alison turned to Emily, her eyes conveying her thoughts of 'are you fucking kidding me?'

"Yes, I'll let Carter know where to meet us." Pulling out her phone and looking back at Alison with eyes that said 'I'm as surprised as you are.'

"Nice to meet you, Sara was it?" Alison couldn't help herself.

"Paige. Yes you too." The girl replied with the fakest smile Alison had ever seen, before turning her attention back to Emily. "It was nice to see you again."

"Yeah." Emily rubbed the back of her neck, putting her phone back in her pocket. "Goodbye Paige."

Alison began walking toward the exit, Emily taking quick strides to catch up to her.

"She just came out of nowhere."

"It's fine." Alison replied, "Judging from what she was wearing she needed to be here."

"Ali." Emily said in a warning tone.

"I'm just saying. Good for her, trying to better herself."

"Ali."

"No wonder you were laughing together, I assume it was at that ghastly pantsuit."

"Ali, you don't have anything to be jealous about." Emily sounded amused now.

"Jealous? Are you kidding me? Of that thing back there?" Alison scoffed, angry that Emily had called her out, she stalked off to find the car.

Once again the car was filled with silence, neither girl made an effort to fill it. After what seemed like an incredibly long journey, they finally arrived back at Alison's.

"Are you coming in?" Alison asked after Carter had left.

"No, I think I better go home. Hanna will be worried, I should let her know I'm still alive." Emily replied.

"Ok. Well I'm at the office tomorrow with my father so you won't be needed, I guess I'll see you the day after." Alison tried to keep the disappointment out of her voice.

"Yeah, have a good afternoon." Emily watched Alison get in safely before setting off back the apartment.

When Emily got home nobody else was in yet. She figured she had about an hour until Hanna got home from work so she got changed and ran to the store to get some ingredients to make dinner. She wasn't much of a chef but she could throw a simple pasta together. Knowing that Caleb would be working late and deciding she wanted to do something nice for her friend.

She was just finishing the sauce when Hanna arrived home.

"Oh my God you're alive." Hanna said with mock relief when she walked into the kitchen to find Emily making a salad.

"Yes I am, and I know I've not been the greatest friend recently so I'm making dinner for you to apologise." She answered, putting some of the sauce on a spoon and handing it to Hanna for her to try.

"Not bad." Hanna said handing the spoon back. "Definitely not your worst attempt."

"You have no room to judge my culinary skills Marin." Emily warned.

"Fair point, so why are you cooking for me?" Hanna leaned against the counter and crossed her arms.

"I told you, I haven't been around much lately and I want you to know I appreciate everything you've done for me." Emily continued with the salad.

"So what exactly is it you want to talk about?" Hanna asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Em, you've cooked for me without being requested to three times in our entire friendship. Each of those times it's been because you wanted to talk to me about something. So spill."

Hanna knew her far too well. Emily kicked herself for not just ordering in.

"I can't talk to you about it."

"Ah, fight club business." Hanna said stealing a tomato and popping it in her mouth.

"But," Emily thought of a loop hole, well she figured it was one. It was a stretch but she really needed to talk to her best friend. "Let's say we're talking hypothetically, about made up people. No private information being given, just completely made up people in completely made up scenarios."

"Okay, let's say that." Hanna nodded.

"Let me plate up and then we'll talk." Emily served up the food and they took it over to the table.

"So," Hanna began, spooning pasta into her mouth. "Talk."

"Well," Emily wasn't sure how to begin. She was torn, she knew she was betraying Ali's trust but she trusted Hanna. Deciding she needed this more, she continued. "So there's these two people."

"What are their names?" Hanna interrupted.

"Does it matter?"

"If I'm going to be invested in their story it does."

"Call them whatever you want. It doesn't matter."

"Okay, let's call them Emma and Alana. You know what would be easier though? Let's just refer to them as Em and Ali." Hanna smirked taking another mouthful of pasta.

"You're not making this any easier." Emily glared.

"I wasn't trying to."

"Well these people…"

"Em and Ali."

Emily glared again, "You're defeating the purpose of this."

"Look, let me guess the story. Em works for Ali, who is a super famous, super rich socialite. She got herself a little too involved in her work and now she's fallen for her boss. She took a chance, they slept together and now it's awkward as fuck?" Hanna finished, staring at Emily as though waiting for applause.

"We didn't sleep together." Emily answered defensively.

"Well at least we can stop this whole make believe thing." Hanna smiled. "When you'd said there was an incident last night and you would be stopping at Alison's I just assumed the incident was your head between her legs."

"Hanna!" Emily reprimanded.

"Sorry." Hanna held her hands up in apology. "So what you kissed her then?"

"Actually she kissed me, I mean I kissed her back, but she kissed me first."

"Oh wow." Hanna sounded genuinely shocked. "And?"

"Then we went to bed."

"And?" Hanna wiggled her eyebrows playfully.

"Nothing, I mean we cuddled, but we just slept. We had a nice morning, I made her breakfast. Then as soon as we left the house it all went to shit. It was like she suddenly regretted everything. Then we bumped into Paige."

"Oh no, that's not what you need." Hanna said sympathetically.

"Actually I think it was, I mean it was horrible and awkward having to introduce them. Alison seemed jealous though, it was nice to know she cares enough to be jealous."

"So what's the core problem?" Hanna asked getting straight to the point.

"I really like her, and I think she likes me too."

"But?" Hanna pressed.

"But I don't want to be some dirty little secret. I know as long as I work for her that's how it has to be, honestly I'd quit tomorrow if I thought we could just be together, but I don't think that's completely it. I think it's because I'm a woman, and this is why you don't mess with straight girls. I just don't know if it's worth it." Emily finished putting her head into her hands with a sigh.

"You want to know what I think?" Hanna asked.

Emily didn't answer, she knew the question was a rhetorical one, Hanna would give her opinion whether she wanted it or not.

"I think you need to talk to her about this, not me. You need to find out exactly where her head is in all this. It can't be easy for her. It's hard enough to suddenly find yourself having feelings for a woman, but imagine having to deal with that in the public eye. She must be confused Em, remember how hard it was for you when you started seeing Maya? How long did you keep that a secret for? You're probably going to have to be patient with her. As for whether or not it's worth it? Only you can answer that."

"When did you get so wise?" Emily smiled at her best friend.

"Always have been," Hanna answered flipping her hair. "I'm like an eagle."

"It's an owl Hanna," Emily chuckled. "But you sure are."

They finished eating and started clearing the table.

"Em, your phone buzzed." Hanna let her know as she came into the kitchen with plates.

She went to the table to pick it up. She had a message from Ali.

'Can you come over? We need to talk.'

Hanna walked back into the room and stood behind her.

"Go, you cooked, I'll clean."

"Are you sure?" Emily felt bad leaving the girl.

"Please go, you need this, Alison needs this. Hell I need this." Hanna joked.

"Thanks Han," Emily hugged her best friend, "Love you."

"I know." Hanna stuck her tongue out as Emily left.

Alison paced in the hallway, Pepe following her every move sensing her nervousness. She was starting to regret texting Emily. Why did they need to talk? Maybe they could just ignore everything that had happened and go back to how things were before. She was about to pull her phone out to tell Emily not to bother coming after all when the door went. She checked the camera, too late, she was here. Before she could convince herself not to, she opened the door to let her in.

"Hey, you're here." Alison greeted dumbly, of course she's here you idiot you asked her to come.

"You wanted to talk?" Emily responded, coming in.

"You want a drink?" Alison had already had two glasses of wine since she'd got home, but suddenly it didn't seem enough.

"Sure." Emily answered, following her into the kitchen.

"I really need to get the living room sorted at least, I'm sick to death of sitting in this kitchen." She rambled as she walked, trying to keep it light.

Alison poured them both a glass, emptying the bottle she had already opened earlier. Emily just raised her eyebrows, but seemingly let it go.

"So, you wanted to talk." Emily asked again.

Right now Alison felt like it was the last thing she wanted to do, so she she just took another drink and stayed silent.

"Ok, well I'll talk then." Emily sighed. "I get it Ali, I do. Last night was, well it was a lot of things. I can't speak for you but for me it was stupid, and inappropriate…"

Alison felt her heart sink. Why? Two minutes ago she was almost set on pretending the whole thing had never happened. So why did it bother her that the brunette was feeling that way.

"..and amazing." Emily finished her sentence. Ali's heart soared again, what the hell was wrong with her?!

"I wouldn't change it for anything. I like you Alison, I mean really like you, and I thought you liked me too. This morning was great, it felt natural, it felt right. Then we leave the house and…what happened? I get that you're scared."

"I'm not scared." Alison felt herself shouting defensively.

"Okay, you have got to stop doing that." Emily stared Alison down.

"Doing what?" Alison couldn't stop the defensive tone in her voice again.

"Shutting me out! Lying! Being a bitch!" Emily threw her hands in the air in despair.

"Did you just call me a bitch?" Her voice was dangerously low and quiet.

"I did, and it has to stop." Emily said defiantly. Alison opened her mouth to let the girl in front of her have it. Nobody spoke to her like that. Emily just held her hand up to shush her and continued, Alison was livid.

"If this is going to work at all. Whatever this is, you have to let me in Ali. You can't keep hiding behind Alison DiLaurentis. You need to be honest with me. Please." Emily reached over and took her hand in hers. Staring into her eyes and causing Alison's anger to dissipate.

Alison couldn't bring herself to say anything still though, Emily's eyes felt like they were staring right into her soul. Finding herself overwhelmed she took back her hand and looked down to her glass.

"I understand, I do." Emily's tone was soft and sweet. "I'm a woman, I'm guessing this is all completely new to you. You're probably really confused right now. I remember when I met my first girlfriend, I was in high school and it was terrifying. Eventually Maya helped me feel comfortable enough to come out and just be me. Not that I'm saying you need to come out, liking one girl doesn't mean you're gay, I just." Emily paused as if collecting her thoughts. "Whatever your orientation you should just be able to be with who you want, and that doesn't have to be me, I just want you to be happy. I got lucky, the people in my life were mostly understanding. Took a while for my parents to come round to the idea, but by the time I met Paige I was comfortable with who I was."

Alison's head shot up at the mention of that particular ex. She couldn't hide the flash of jealousy that crossed her face.

"Seriously Ali, you really have nothing to be jealous of with her."

"I'm not jealous!" Alison snapped again.

Emily just gave her a pointed look. "What I'm saying is, I don't want to make your life hard. I don't want to make you uncomfortable. I don't regret kissing you, I never will and I would love the opportunity to be the one to make you happy, but if it's not what you want then I'll walk away no hard feelings." Emily finished and waited for Alison to speak.

Alison continued to stare at her glass. A million thoughts racing through her head. She took a deep breath, if she was ever going to open up to anyone, it was going to be the brunette sat in front her now.

"The whole world is constantly waiting for me to fall, to read about my latest drama. My whole life is just entertainment for them. I can't face being dragged through the press, the headlines, what they would write about you. Not to mention my parents, they'd be so angry. Half because it's a woman, half because it's the 'help'. The way they'd treat you. It's all too complicated, and the more I think about it the more these seem like valid reasons to forget this ever happened."

Alison finally looked up to see Emily's chocolate eyes staring at her intently. Taking another deep breath she continued.

"But then I'm selfish, I'm selfish because I can't stand the thought of you being with anyone else. I wanted to rip Paige's head off for even looking at you, and yet you deserve someone who can look at you like that in public, who can hold your hand in the street. You are the best person I've ever known and I can't even take you out on a date, or even let anybody know we're together. Because if they did find out, your entire life would change, you'd become public property. I'm just not worth it Em." Alison's eyes were filled with tears now, she knew she'd overdone it with the wine.

"Don't I get to decide that?" Emily took Alison's hand again.

"Em, there are a million reasons why this would never work." Alison sighed.

"There are a million reasons why this wouldn't work." Emily nodded in thoughtful agreement with her.

"Like I said, my parents…"

"Opinions don't matter if you're happy and doing nothing legally wrong." Emily finished for her.

"It's not like we could have a normal relationship, we wouldn't exactly have date nights and you wouldn't be able to accompany me to events."

"Haven't you heard of Netflix and chill?" Emily smiled, "Plus I do actually accompany you to all your events."

"That's not what I meant." Alison rolled her eyes and found herself giggling, nobody made her laugh like Emily. Then she remembered the situation they were in and got serious again.

"Look, I'm Alison DiLaurentis. I've appeared on the front of every magazine, I can't walk down the street without being stopped every four feet. The police department are given a copy of my schedule so they can assess if they need to place officers. I am on the top ten list of most followed social media accounts every year. I am on the top ten list of most influential people every year. I am one of the most photographed people in the world. My life is public domain and so is anyone's that's associated with me. My career is my reputation." Alison finished, hoping that she had got through to Emily just how hard this could be for them.

"No you're not." Emily answered softly, shaking her head.

"Excuse me?" Alison questioned, eyebrows raised.

"Sorry to knock you down off that lofty perch you've built for yourself there, but that isn't who you are. It may be your career, your reputation, but it's not you." Emily spoke more boldly now.

"Oh, I forgot you were such an expert on me." Alison couldn't keep the bitchy tone from her voice as she spoke, "Please, enlighten me Emily. Who am I then?"

"You're Ali." Emily answered her calmly. "You have the manners of a goat on the outside, but on the inside you're one of the sweetest people I've ever known. God knows you hide it well though. Your sense of humour is amazing, and your laugh is like hearing my favourite song. You're smart and you love crosswords. You like only cheese on your pizza and you're a coffee snob. Your favourite film is Love Actually, because it has every aspect of love in it, the good and the bad. Your best friend is a dog, a dog that thinks you're his 'mama'. You don't trust anyone, not even yourself. It takes you, on average, 15 minutes to type out a 140 character tweet, and don't get me started on how long it takes you to take a photo for Instagram. You like to cuddle, and you can eat more than most of the guys that were in my unit. When you sleep, you're so still and quiet that I have to check you're still breathing. Oh and you hate hotels." Emily finished her rant.

Alison let a tear slide down her cheek.

"So yes, there are a million reasons why this will never work, but there are also a million reasons I'm willing to try anyway." Emily leaned over to gently brush the tear away with her thumb.

Alison inhaled sharply at the girls touch, as she remembered the first time Emily had performed that act. How her pulse had quickened then, how it always quickened at Emily's touch.

"I'm scared." Alison finally managed to whisper out.

"So am I." Emily whispered back. "But you're worth it to me Ali. I don't exactly want to head back into the closet, but if we have to be a secret for now then I'm willing to try. The question is, am I worth it to you?"

Alison knew how she felt, vocalising it was a different matter. She had always kept her feelings in check, it was how she'd been raised. Never let anyone in, never give them too much. After what seemed like the longest silence she finally spoke.

"I think you are, and that's what terrifies me the most."

The next thing she knew Emily's lips were on hers. It wasn't a deep kiss, but it was filled with passion. Then she was back on her stool, Alison left sat with her eyes closed, savouring the feeling.

"How about a trial, one week." She opened her eyes to see Emily grinning at her like an idiot.

"I'll take it." Alison grinned back. Her apprehension was still there, but she had been right the previous night. She didn't want to go a day without kissing Emily Fields.

Emily woke up the next morning with a spring in her step. She had left Ali's the previous night and practically skipped home. Hanna had waited up for her and teased her relentlessly before Emily had flipped her off and gone to bed. She was out on her usual morning run when her phone went off.

'So I'm at the office all day with my Dad, I'm so bored. I know it's your day off but if you wanted to come over tonight that would be OK.'

Emily chuckled at Ali's attempt at an invite. Deciding to see if she could make the girl actually ask her outright she text back.

'Just ok?'

She didn't get an immediate response so she tucked her phone away and continued her run, she wanted to get it over with quickly, she had a busy day ahead of her.

As she got out of the shower she saw she had a message. She picked up her phone and smiled at Ali's response.

'Fine. Emily, would you like to come over tonight? It would be more than ok.'

'I would love to. I'll see you when you get home.'

'I'll text you when I'm leaving the office.'

She put her phone down and started to put her plans for the day into motion.

Alison was finally on her way home, she hated days at the office. She had no desire to run the family 'empire'. Unfortunately because her brother was an unreliable addict, a fact concealed from the press surprisingly well, her father had passed the burden onto her. She quickly text Emily, unable to keep the smile from her face. As she finished she caught Carter's eye in the mirror. He returned her smile and then turned his attention back to the road.

When she finally arrived home she realised Emily still hadn't replied. Feeling a bit disappointed that the brunette might have made other plans she unlocked the door and headed inside. Pepe didn't greet her at the door as usual and she called out for him.

"We're in here!" Came Emily's voice from the kitchen.

Confused as to why Emily was already inside her house she walked to the kitchen, gasping as she entered.

"Surprise."

Emily was sat at the counter, which had dinner set up for two. There were candles and Emily got up to press play on a portable CD player. Gentle background music began to play.

"I know you don't like people in the house when you're not here, but I figured you wouldn't mind if it was just me. Martha agreed so she let me in."

Alison stayed in the doorway, speechless.

"Are you mad?" Emily asked, sounding worried.

Alison finally found her voice, "No, not at all. I'm just…wow."

Emily grinned, holding her arms out at the scene, "Date night."

Alison couldn't hold back her own grin. Nobody had ever done anything like this for her before, however she decided that she shouldn't be surprised that the cheesy brunette had. This had Emily written all over it.

"I know it's not a table at Masa but…"

"It's perfect Em," Alison gushed as she finally walked into the kitchen.

"Don't worry, I ordered in. I don't want to scare you away with my cooking just yet."

"So you do plan to scare me away with it eventually?" Alison questioned with a smile.

"Oh no, I plan that by the time I actually cook for you, you'll be far too enamoured with me to care about food poisoning." Emily smirked in response.

Emily pulled out her stool for her and she sat down.

"So what's on the menu?" Alison couldn't wipe the smile off her face.

"Chinese."

"I like Chinese."

"I know, I'm an expert on you remember." Emily said cockily as she took her own seat.

Alison just laughed, Emily was definitely worth it.

The dinner was amazing, not particularly in terms of the food, which was nice enough, but it was the best dinner date Alison had ever had. They chatted easily throughout. Talking about their days, Alison ranted about hers, but Emily seemed very vague about what she'd been up to. Emily had her laughing again about something as she got up to clean up the plates.

"Wow, the magazine on Hanna's coffee table was right, celebrities really are just like us." Emily mocked.

Alison just rolled her eyes, "I can put plates in a dishwasher, but other than that I'm a, what was it People magazine said? An ethereal goddess I think it was."

"Oh yeah, absolutely." Emily dead panned, walking over to her and wiping sauce from the corner of her mouth she hadn't realised was there. Causing her to blush.

"If only they knew hm?" Her giggle stopping short as Emily licked the sauce off her thumb.

"Come on, I have another surprise for you." Emily grabbed Ali's hand and pulled her to follow, seemingly unfazed by the intimate gesture she had just performed.

Alison followed her blindly, wondering what on earth Emily was so eager to show her.

"Right close your eyes." Emily sounded giddy.

"Emily what are you doing?" Alison asked unwilling to do as she was told.

"Please, close your eyes." Emily turned to look at her, "Trust me."

The words hung in the air heavily for a moment, before Alison relented and closed her eyes.

"Okay, just a few more steps." Emily had her hands on her shoulders, walking behind her, guiding her through the house. "You can open them now."

Alison opened her eyes, knowing from the route they taken from the kitchen that they were in the living room. It was completely finished. The walls were all painted, the furniture was in place, no more dust sheets. Her large TV, which had been in leaning against the wall, was now mounted on it. She turned to the corner to see the large piano that occupied it uncovered, and standing proudly.

"Now I know you still have to put pictures up and little trinkets about the place, but at least you can sit in here now."

"Emily," Alison turned around to face her, completely in awe of the girl in front of her, "I don't know what to say."

"Say you like it?" Emily stood awkwardly, rubbing the back of her neck. A sign that Ali had come to notice meant she was feeling uncomfortable, "I hope I didn't overstep, it's just you were complaining about it last night and…"

Alison interrupted her by throwing her arms around the brunette's neck and leaning up to kiss her soundly.

"Thank you." She wanted to say so much more, but she felt it was the only words she could muster.

Emily looked relieved as she put her hands only Alison's waist, pulling her closer.

"So, Netflix and chill?" Emily asked putting her forehead against Alison's.

Alison just laughed, taking her hand and leading her over to the couch.

They were laying on the couch, Alison between Emily's legs, head resting on her chest while Emily traced absent minded patterns up and down Alison's arm. Some documentary about serial killers was playing on the TV. Alison had long since stopped watching, instead her thoughts were occupied by the movements of Emily's hand and the nagging feeling that she didn't deserve any of this.

"Em." She said quietly.

"Yes Ali." The words vibrating into her ear still on Emily's chest.

"Why did you do all this?" She asked, sitting up so she could look at her.

"Because I wanted to." Emily shrugged.

"But why?"

"Because I like you, and I want to see you happy, and you're worth it." Emily smiled at her warmly.

"Okay." Alison resumed her previous position, her thoughts still racing. Was Emily hoping that all of this would get her lucky tonight? The other night, when her adrenaline was pumping she had been more than willing to have sex with the beautiful tanned woman. Now though, she was glad that Emily had put the brakes on. It wasn't that she didn't want to eventually, but something was different now. It felt more serious, more real, and she didn't think she was ready.

"What's wrong?" Emily sensed her sudden discomfort.

"Nothing," Alison lied. Lying, something Emily had told her she needed to stop. Composing herself she sat back up and looked down at her lap. "It's just…what are you expecting out of tonight? I mean you've done these wonderful things, these grand gestures and it can't be for nothing. What expectations do you have here?" She finished looking up.

"Expectations? I told you why I did this, what do you mean?" Emily looked at her confused before her eyes widened. "Oh." She started to laugh.

Alison felt her cheeks go red, embarrassed she looked down again.

"I'm sorry Ali," Emily stopped laughing, but a smile stayed on her face as she reached out and tilted Alison's face to look at her, "I didn't mean to laugh. Honestly I hadn't thought of it that way, I can see why you'd think that's what I was after. Particularly with the whole 'Netflix and chill' thing. I can promise you though that I have no expectations. Actually I was thinking we should take all of that slow. I told you the other night, I want to do this right."

Alison was completely sure now that she didn't deserve the sweet woman at all.

"Ali, what's wrong?" Emily asked, concern lacing her voice.

"I never do anything nice for you, you've been doing nice things for me since the day we met, and I never do anything for you."

"You gave me a chance." Emily said sincerely.

"That's not what I mean." Alison replied sadly.

"Okay, you want to do something nice for me?" Emily asked after a beat.

"I do."

Emily pointed over to the piano, "Play me something."

Alison's gaze followed Emily's finger to the instrument, "Like what?"

"I don't care, I just want to hear you play. Please?"

Alison got up and walked over, taking a seat at the stool and lifting the cover. Suddenly she felt incredibly nervous. She'd been playing since she was 5, she was more than competent, but she didn't want to embarrass herself if she messed up.

"Just play anything," Emily said from across the room, still seated on the couch. "The first song that comes into you head."

Alison placed her hands on the keys about to play the first song she'd thought of, before stopping herself and instead beginning to play Moonriver instead.

"Wow." She heard Emily gasp from the couch, as her fingers danced across the keys. "You're amazing."

"Shut up." Alison stopped her playing and turned on the stool, for some reason embarrassed at Emily's compliment.

"Please don't stop." Emily requested softly, her warm brown eyes staring directly into her own.

Alison turned back around on the stool and continued the song. Once it was finished she looked behind her to see Emily laid out on the sofa, fast asleep.

"Em?" She called, the girl was definitely out. She turned back to the piano and took a deep breath before starting to play the song that had popped into her head first. She began softly singing along to the music,

"Wise men say, only fools rush in…"

W **ell there you have it, chapter 7. Some sad news, or happy depending on whether on not you are enjoying my tale I suppose. It will be at least another week before I update again as I'm going on my jolly's. In the mean time while you wait, why not leave me your thoughts, options, or general musings. Doesn't even have to be about the story, if you have something you want to share, knock yourself out : ) I hope you're all well and living the dream. As always, much love.**


	8. Chapter 8

**I'm back! My apologies for the long absence, I could bore you with all the excuses but let's be honest you don't really care. Instead lets just be happy that chapter 8 is here! You don't have to be of course, or you can be happy that it's here and then change your mind once you've read it, that is also an option. Who am I to tell you how to feel. How sad is it that PLL is no more. Did everyone see Ash and Mar's drunk snapchats? Mate I was creased, actually howling with laughter. All the snaps throughout the day were very sad though, and if I wasn't raised so stiff upper lip I might have shed a tear. Anyway thank you so much for your amazing reviews and follows and joy giving actions. You're all delightful, lovely people. I hope you enjoy this next instalment. I basically just sat and wrote all but one paragraph of this in one long session and it's now almost 2am so let's find out what the hell I wrote together shall we...**

It had been two weeks since her and Ali had started, well whatever it was they had started. Emily wasn't sure what to call it, they hadn't defined the terms of their relationship and Emily didn't want to raise the subject with Alison in case trying to put a label on it scared the blonde off again. One thing that had definitely become apparent to Emily though was the level of Alison's fame. She wasn't lying when she said she couldn't walk four feet without someone stopping her or shouting across the street. The majority of the time it was adoring fans that meant well, occasionally though it was rather obscene things shouted by horny men that made Emily want to march over and put them in their place. The problem was though that she couldn't. She couldn't punch the paparazzi that constantly seemed to be buzzing around like parasites getting in their way as they tried to go anywhere, all fighting for the best shot. She had made her own fair share of appearances in the background of photos in many magazines and Internet sites, something that Hanna had been far more excited about than she had. It wasn't that this wasn't happening before, it's just that she had become far more aware of it in the last few weeks. Her feeling of need to protect the socialite was stronger than ever, and most of the time she couldn't do anything about it. Another problem she was having was keeping her libido in check. She was being honest when she said she wanted to do this right and take things slow, but honestly she had never gone this long without sex and it was starting to take its toll on her. Many of their date nights had ended with increasingly heated make out sessions on the couch, Emily never moving her hands where they wanted to go. She didn't want to push Ali, and that had resulted in a lot of cold showers recently.

"You missed a spot." Emily said walking over to where Ali was stood painting the last wall in the spare bedroom. Alison had been spurred on to actually get the house finished ever since Emily had sorted out the living room, and after decorating none stop for the last two weeks they were finally onto the only room left unfinished.

"Where?" Alison studied the wall intently trying to see where Emily meant.

"Right…" Emily stuck her own brush out toward the wall, before quickly turning it on Ali and painting her cheek "There."

"You ass!" Alison stared at Emily with disbelief.

"Wow, that colour really brings out your eyes." Emily cocked her head mockingly.

Alison went to retaliate but Emily quickly side stepped her attempt before fleeing out of the room.

"Yeah you better run!" She heard Ali shout from behind her as she chased her down the stairs.

Realising she had nowhere to go without getting paint all over the newly finished downstairs Emily stood in the hallway, ready to take the consequences. Alison stalked toward her, paint brush in hand. Before breaking into a run again and flying at her. Anticipating her move Emily waited until she was within arms reach and quickly disarmed her of the messy weapon. Spinning her round so she was stood behind the blonde, arms wrapped firmly around her so that she couldn't move.

"Come on now Ali, let's not do something you're going to regret." She spoke into her ear, noticing the girl in her arms visibly shiver.

"Oh I don't think I'd regret it." Ali tilted her head back, as if to kiss her.

"Yeah?" Emily leaned her head forward to meet Alison halfway, only to realise too late she had been tricked. Ali rubbing the paint off her cheek onto Emily's own face.

"Well played." Emily laughed as she moved to kiss the giggling girl in her arms. Neither of them heard the door open.

"Well it seems like fun in here today."

Alison shot out of Emily's arms as they both turned to face the interruption.

"Martha." Alison stood like a rabbit in headlights. "We were just, we were painting."

Emily, unsure of what to say just stood dumbly beside her and held up the paintbrush in her hand, as if to corroborate the story.

"I can tell that from looking at you both." Martha laughed, gesturing to their faces.

"Fields was just helping me." Alison sounded uncomfortable.

"Well it's nice to see you've made a friend dear." Martha replied with a smile and headed into the kitchen.

"I should probably go get cleaned up. Thanks for your help Fields, I'll see you tomorrow." Alison's tone was very much back to the one she used for the rest of the help.

"Yeah, I should probably head home and get myself sorted too. It was my pleasure, Miss DiLaurentis." She couldn't help but feel a bit annoyed that their afternoon had been cut short, or that Alison was back to being so cold toward her because someone else was there. This was the choice she had made though and she had to deal with it. Even if she had turned into someone's dirty little secret.

She let herself into the house the next day and was greeted by Pepe at the door. Alison had an appearance at the snapchat offices, followed by a meet and greet. She couldn't say she was looking forward to it.

"Ali?" She shouted into the house.

"Up here." Came the reply.

Following the voice she headed upstairs and into the bedroom. Unable to see Alison in the bedroom she headed into her dressing room and quickly lost all ability to think. Alison was stood in front of the full length mirror in nothing but her lacy underwear. She turned to Emily.

"Hey, are you alright?"

Emily tried to form words as best she could, managing to stutter out, "I'm sorry when you said up here I figured you were ready, I didn't mean to, I'm sorry, I'll just." She gestured toward the door.

"Please, are you kidding me? Pretty much the whole world has seen me in my underwear."

Emily couldn't help the jealousy that must have been evident on her face, because Alison started laughing.

"I mean I've done hundreds of photo shoots like this. Did you want something?"

All logical thought had escaped Emily, she desperately tried to remember why she had come upstairs. However all she could think about was how much she wanted to put her mouth over every inch of exposed skin in front of her.

"My face is up here."

Emily raised her eyes to meet Alison's, who was now wearing a large smirk. Why couldn't she form a thought that didn't include pinning the blonde against that wall? This wasn't her, yes she'd only had two serious relationships, but she'd had quite a string of meaningless flings. It was always her that left other girls like this, not the other way round. Alison cleared her throat, Emily realised she'd let her eyes drop down again, they were greedily taking in the sight in front of her. Where was her witty comeback? Her flirting A game? She quickly raised her eyes again to see Alison stood with her hands on her hips, looking at her still smirking.

"I'll wait for you downstairs." Emily choked out.

"What I don't even get a proper hello?" Alison started to move toward her, swaying her hips.

Not trusting herself, Emily quickly mumbled something about Carter waiting, turned on her heel and fled. She swore she heard Alison chuckling as she left.

Emily was correct in thinking she wasn't going to enjoy the day's activities. It was more of the same, the barrage of paparazzi on arrival and and the usual leering and obscene remarks from the occasional disrespectful spectator. It didn't seem to faze Alison at all, but Emily had to work hard to keep her emotions in check. The meet and greet was only 15 minutes, but in that time 6 people had tried to give Alison their number, Emily was pretty sure that one of them was a guy from the office. The majority of the fans and competition winners just gushed over her and two people cried. Emily didn't know how she did it, she couldn't live like that, but Alison took it all in her stride.

After what seemed like the longest time they were finally in the car and on their way back home. Emily quietly staring out the window.

"Are you okay?" Alison whispered over to her.

"I'm fine." Emily turned to give her a tight lipped smile and then went back to staring at the passing scenery.

Feeling her phone vibrate moments later she looked at it to see a message from Alison.

'What's wrong?'

Sighing, Emily text back.

'Nothing, it's stupid.'

'If it's important to you then it's not stupid, tell me. No lies and no shutting out remember?'

Annoyed at her own words being used against her, Emily gave in and began to type.

'I don't like the way they treat you, the things some of them say to you, the way they look at you.'

'How's that?'

'Well some of them actually just say it outright. Like they want to fuck you right there in the street.'

'That bothers you?'

Emily paused again, was she allowed to be bothered by it? Did she have a right to be? It wasn't like they'd defined the boundaries of any of this. Deciding to carry on with the honesty she finally messaged back.

'Of course it does. Doesn't it bother you?'

'I'm used to it.'

'That's not what I asked.'

'That's my appeal, that's how I'm marketed. People either want to be me or fuck me.'

'Still not what I asked.'

Before Alison could reply Emily quickly tapped out another message.

'Have you ever taken one of the numbers?'

She could guess from the noise that Alison made after reading it what the answer would be so it didn't surprise her when she received it.

'God no! I have never taken a fans number, never mind slept with one.''

Emily let out the breath she didn't realise she'd been holding in, then her phone went again.

'As for whether or not it bothers me when they look at me like they want to fuck me? Yes I'm used to it so it doesn't really bother me, but no I don't like being looked at like that. With one exception.'

Emily furrowed her eyebrows.

'Exception?'

'Well I certainly didn't mind it when you were looking at me like that this morning.'

Emily felt the blood rush to her face as she quickly turned her head to look at Alison, who was now staring out of her own window. No sign on her face of the text she had just sent. Her eyes then shot to the drivers seat for any indication that Carter had seen her sudden embarrassment, his eyes however were fixed firmly to the road ahead. Suddenly feeling the need for a very cold shower, she turned to stare out of her own window trying to stop the inappropriate thoughts she was having about Alison and the back seat of the car.

"What do you want for dinner?" Alison asked, turning to face her as Emily shut the door behind them.

Unable to stop herself any longer she grabbed Alison face in her hands and kissed her with a hunger she'd tried to suppress for weeks. Spinning them round so that the blonde was pinned between her and the wall. Alison let out a delicious moan as Emily pressed her body as close as it could possibly go, hands in those golden locks, Alison kissing her back with just as much enthusiasm. Emily left her lips to trail kisses down her jaw and begin sucking on the soft skin near her exposed collar bone.

"Don't you dare leave a mark." Alison panted out, although her tone carried no real conviction.

Emily heeded her warning though and moved her lips back to Ali's, before sliding her hands down her back and grabbing her ass. She tentatively gave a gentle squeeze, the noise that the blonde released into her mouth nearly made her legs give way. It was all the encouragement she needed to take a firmer hold and lift Ali up, who wasted no time in wrapping her legs around Emily and her arms around her neck. With Alison's dress now bunched up around her hips Emily moved her hands, sliding them along her now exposed thighs. The blonde let another whimper fall into Emily's mouth. Emily pushed her harder against the wall for support, it was then that she felt the heat of Alison's core which was pressed firmly against her stomach. She couldn't help but release her own moan at the sensation. Pulling away from those glorious heart shaped lips she rested her forehead against Ali's, both breathing heavily. The blondes pupils were blown, and Emily was pretty sure the look of want in those eyes mirrored her own.

They were still staring into each other's eyes when the moment was interrupted by the ring of Emily's phone.

"You should get that." Alison said, not taking her eyes off Emily's.

"Yeah." Emily didn't make any move to do so though, she didn't ever want to put Ali down from their current position.

"Em?" Ali laughed now, "The phone? It might be important."

Emily unwillingly lowered Alison back to her feet and pulled her phone out of her back pocket. If it was Hanna it was definitely going to voicemail. When she saw it was Spencer however, she quickly swiped to answer.

"Hey Spence." She tried to sound like she hadn't just had the hottest make out session of her life.

Alison smiled at her before heading into the kitchen and leaving her to her conversation.

"Emily, hey are you free for a quick chat?"

Emily's eyes followed Alison's behind into the kitchen thinking, no I am not. The stress in her friends voice sounded like a more pressing matter though.

"Yeah I am, is everything okay?"

"Yeah, well no, look Em I need a favour." Spencer was never one to beat around the bush.

"What can I help with?" If she could help her friends out she always would.

"I need your boss."

"You need what now?" Emily asked, assuming she'd misheard.

"Alison DiLaurentis. I need her."

"For what?" Emily was feeling pretty confused.

"My mother is holding an education fundraiser in New York tomorrow night. The celebrity speaker we were meant to have has cancelled, so I was hoping you could ask your boss for me. I don't mean to put you in an awkward position here but this was the quickest channel I could think of to get in touch with her."

"Why Alison?" Emily questioned, she made a lot of appearances and she was very in demand, but an education event?

"Well she was consistently top of her class and she graduated from Brown with degrees in English literature and business, so I assume education is important to her. I think it would be good for the young people she would be addressing to see that you can have all that beauty but the brains are just as important."

Emily was silent for a moment letting that sink in. Alison graduated from Brown with two degrees? She realised she knew less about her than she thought.

"Em?" Spencer's voice brought her back.

"I can ask her."

"Oh Em that's fantastic, I know how persuasive you can be so I'm just going to put her down as a yes. Just remind her that she's volunteering her time, no payment. Thank you so much for this. You've really saved my Mom's butt."

"Spence I said I'd ask, I really can't promise anything."

"Sure you can, this is brilliant. I'll see you tomorrow Em!" With that, Spencer hung up.

How was she going to convince Alison to do this? Confidence, she just had to go in there with with confidence and persuade Ali that this would be a great thing. Taking a deep breath she headed into the kitchen where she found the blonde making them dinner.

"So that was Spencer…" Emily began trying to sound casual.

"The lawyer who's mom is a senator right?"

Emily couldn't help but smile knowing that Ali had actually cared enough to listen when she spoke about her friends.

"Yeah that's her. They're in town tomorrow for an education fundraiser." Build up to it slowly Emily thought.

"That's nice, are you meeting up?" Alison continued to chop.

"Yeah, about that. I didn't know you graduated from Brown?" Emily moved closer to her.

"Not many people do, it doesn't really interest the magazines. No pictures to print of me dancing naked at a keg party." Alison scoffed.

"Yeah." Emily rubbed the back of her neck absentmindedly.

"Okay, what's going on?" Alison put down the knife and stood in front of Emily with her arms crossed.

"What makes you think somethings going on?" Emily tried to feign innocence. Alison just raised her eyebrow at her, a look on her face that said 'seriously'.

"Spencer asked me if I could ask you if you'd speak at her mothers event tomorrow night. I know that you're going to say no, but hear me out. This would benefit so many people, including you. Yeah I know you wouldn't get paid, but you've got loads of money! Not that that's important to you. You'd be inspiring so many young people there, in a generation where selfie sticks outsell books you could show them it's better to buy both! You could remind people that you actually do have a brain as well as beauty. All you'd have to do is a little speech, maybe answer a few questions and then you can leave." Emily blurted out without taking a breath, then braced herself for Alison's inevitable no.

"No." There it was. She turned to pick the knife up again.

"Please, you'd be helping out my friend so much." Emily begged.

"No." Alison continued with her chopping.

Time to pull out the big guns, "You once said that you never did anything nice for me, that I did nice things for you all the time, but you never did them for me. This would be a nice thing to do for me Ali. Please." She put on her best puppy dog eyes as Alison turned to face her.

"This isn't for you though." Ali reasoned.

"It's for my friend, trust me that means a lot more to me." Emily answered.

"Fine!" Alison relented after a moments silence.

"Really you'll do it?!" Emily never actually expected that to work.

"Yes, I'll do it. I'm not thrilled about it but I can see the positives in this for my image. Also my father will love it so he'll get off my back for a while."

"Plus it's a nice thing to do." Emily couldn't help but make fun of Alison's reasoning as she stood behind her, wrapping her arms around her waist and placing her head on the shorter girls shoulder.

"Yeah sure whatever." Ali threw up her hand and went back to the dinner.

They were about five minutes away from the event and Emily was yet to see Alison look up from her speech once. She had been reading it the entire way there. Karen had emailed it over that afternoon. She had let Emily read it, her response had been 'it doesn't sound like you'. Alison had gone into one of her strops shouting that she didn't write it and it was too late to sort out another one so they'd just have to cancel. Emily had finally managed to calm her down about an hour later, telling her that the speech was a good speech that's not what she was saying. Then going on to say that Ali could have written a better one herself had started yet another argument, which had taken her a lot longer to calm down from.

"You're going to be great." Emily leaned over and took to the speech out of her hands. "You can over prepare you know."

"Why am I so damn nervous? Do you know the last time I was nervous at an event?" Alison asked.

"I do not." Emily replied calmly.

"Me neither!" Alison practically shouted. "That's my point!"

Emily put the speech down between them and reached over to take Alison's hands in hers.

"You're going to be great." She spoke calmly again before forgetting where she was and bringing the stressed out blondes hands to her mouth, kissing them gently.

Alison must have also forgotten with her mind focused so heavily on freaking out, because she leaned her head against Emily's and closed her eyes, seemingly relaxing into the feeling.

"We've arrived."

Carter's voice broke them from their moment. Alison pulling away from Emily, more stressed out now than before.

"Carter I…" She began before being interrupted by the usually quiet driver.

"If I may be permitted Miss DiLaurentis I would just like to say two things." Carter asked.

Alison seemed in shock so Emily spoke up, "Go ahead Carter."

He smiled softly as he turned to face them, "One, I see and hear nothing that happens in the back of my car."

Emily couldn't help but smile at him, Alison now had her mouth slightly open in horror.

"Two, Emily is right, you're going to be great." This seemed to bring Ali back round a bit. "Now I'm going to get out and open your door. I'm a bit tired today though so it might take me a bit longer than usual. Shall we say a minute?" Carter smiled at them again before turning to open his door.

"Carter?" Alison finally spoke up.

"Yes Miss DiLaurentis?" He turned back to face her.

"Thank you."

Emily smiled warmly at the girl next to her, thinking how far she'd come. Sure she'd reverted back to old ways earlier in the day, but the fact that Carter still had a job never mind got a thank you spoke volumes. Carter just nodded and got out of the car.

When the door was shut Alison turned to her again. "Em, I'm scared."

"You heard Carter, you're going to be great." Emily smiled taking her hands again and gently placing a kiss to her forehead, knowing that if she messed up her make up she'd never be forgiven.

They heard a gentle knock on Alison's door which was opened ten seconds later by Carter. Emily quickly let herself out and made her way round.

"Look after her." Carter said to her quietly before Ali got out.

To anyone else they were simple words to someone responsible for security. Emily knew they were a lot more than that though. She never realised Carter cared that much for his boss.

"I will." She promised him and then Alison was at her side.

They made it inside and Emily spotted Spencer and her mother straight away.

"Come on, there's people I want you to meet." .

"Em!" Spencer greeted her with a hug when they made it over.

"Hey Spence, Mrs Hastings." She wasn't sure if she was meant to hug the senator in public or not.

"Come here right now Emily Fields." Spencer's mom hugged her warmly.

"Guys this is Alison DiLaurentis." Emily introduced. "Miss DiLaurentis this is Spencer and Veronica Hastings."

"It's a pleasure to meet you both." Alison smiled warmly, shaking both of their hands.

"Thank you so much for doing this Miss DiLaurentis." Mrs Hastings looked at Alison with gratitude.

"It's my pleasure Senator. I'm sorry we're a little late." Alison replied.

"Nonsense you're right on time, although you are on stage in ten minutes so I'm sorry you don't have much time to get settled."

"I'll show you to the room can you prepare in." Spencer gestured for them to follow her.

"Just let us know if you need anything." Spencer said before closing the door and leaving them to it.

"Right, I best go over this speech again." Alison said holding her hand out.

"I don't have it." Emily said, then she saw the panic set into Ali's face.

"I left it on the fucking back seat!" The blonde sat down on a chair and put her head in her hands.

"Hey," Emily knelt down in front of her, "it's going to be fine, just make it up."

Alison lifted her head, "Make it up?! Are you fucking kidding me right now?!"

Emily knew Alison was after an argument and she wasn't going to rise to the bait.

"You are a smart, intelligent, amazing woman. You can do this. All you have to do is go out there and talk about your experiences with education and your opinions on it. The key word is your. It's your thoughts that people want to hear so the wonderful thing about that is, they're all up here." Emily softly tapped Ali's head with her finger. "So yeah make it up as you go along, people will love it regardless."

"What if they don't?" Alison looked up at Emily, the last time she had seen that look in her eyes it was when she was talking about her mother. She had no confidence in herself at all.

"Are you kidding? It's you, babe people hang off every word you say. I'm sure they'll be no different today and they'll have loads of amazing questions for you. Just go out there and be yourself. Not Alison DiLaurentis, be yourself." She finished and mentally berated herself for using the pet name, it had just slipped out. Alison didn't react to it though and Emily was secretly hoping she'd not noticed it.

"Maybe it should be you up there, you're the one who's always giving speeches." Alison pouted.

Apparently she hadn't. "Yeah but I don't look as good in my underwear so I never get booked." Emily joked standing up and moving behind Ali to massage her shoulders and hopefully relieve some of her tension.

"I'll be the judge of that." Alison said causing Emily to gulp, "Hopefully I'll be a bit more eloquent than you were so I can actually tell you how good you look." She mocked.

Emily went red at being reminded of her embarrassing moment. She hated how Alison could do what no other girl had ever managed, and turn her into a stuttering mess. At the same time though she loved it, she'd never been challenged like that before. It was nice for things not to be so easy.

"Oh my God your fingers are amazing." Alison practically moaned with her eyes shut.

Unable to stop herself Emily leaned forward to whisper in her ear, "Oh you have no idea."

A knock on the door made Emily jump back.

"Come in." A flustered Alison called out.

Spencer's head popped through the door, "You ready?"

"Yeah, I'll be right there." Alison replied regaining her composure and getting up.

"See you out there." Spencer smiled left.

Alison walked toward the door, "I can do this." She seemed to be saying it more to herself than Emily.

"Damn right you can." Emily replied anyway.

Alison reached the door and grabbed the handle before turning back to Emily with a raised eyebrow. "Babe?"

Emily felt herself go red again, "Yeah sorry about that, I didn't…"

Alison interrupted her, "I never said I didn't like it." Then she opened the door and stepped out.

Emily watched from the side of the stage as Alison reached the podium. The room had burst into applause as she had walked out, and now everyone was staring at her expectantly. Emily really hoped this went well, she knew the socialite was more than capable of doing this.

"Good evening, my name is Alison DiLaurentis." She started which received more applause. "So I did have a speech for you tonight, but I left it in my car. I may have beauty and brains but apparently not any organisational skills."

This got a laugh and Alison seemed to relax a little bit. Emily silently willed her on from her spot off stage.

"Most people know exactly what make up I use and where I went on holiday. What most people don't know is that I graduated from Brown University with degrees in English literature and business. Education is important, my life may seem frivolous and easy but I actually put a lot of work into my brand. That's where my business degree comes in handy, yes I had a hand up in life because of my family, but one day that business will be mine and because of my education I'll actually have an idea of what I'm doing. So that will give me an advantage over my father." The audience laughed again, Emily couldn't help the smile on her face as Alison continued, "Fun fact, I didn't actually want to do business. My original dream was to just do English and then become a teacher. Yeah I know, me a teacher, can you imagine? Or an author, I love books, reading brings people joy. You get to escape into all of these amazing worlds, I wanted to bring that same joy into other people's lives. My father insisted I do business as well though, turned out I really enjoyed it. Anyway as you all know, neither of those dreams came true. Never say never though, I could still pen the great American novel."

Emily realised again how little she really knew about Ali, she didn't know anything about these dreams. They would definitely have to play the question game again.

Alison's speech continued eloquently and beautifully. Emily was so proud of her and the audience stood to applaud when she had finished. Alison was absolutely beaming.

"What a wonderful, truly inspiring speech. If it's okay with Miss DiLaurentis we will now open the floor for any questions from our young guests." Veronica said as she walked out onto the stage next to Alison.

"Ask away." Alison nodded eagerly.

A young brunette with glasses raised her hand first.

"You said you were the top of your class in most subjects, did you have many problems with bullying? It's not exactly cool to be smart."

"I didn't, I'm ashamed to say I wasn't the nicest person in school. Actually some people would tell you I'm not the nicest person now, but I'm working on that." She turned to smile at Emily, "I suppose I was one of the bully's, and that was definitely not cool. Being smart though is the coolest thing, never ever let anybody tell you otherwise. You'll have a lot more opportunities in life if you work hard in your studies, nobody cares who the popular kids were when you're grown up."

"You seem nice to me." The girl replied shyly.

"Thank you…what's your name?"

"Beth."

"Thank you Beth." Alison smiled warmly. "Next question."

Another girl raised her hand, "You say you love books and reading, I just wondered what your favourite book was?"

"Ah, I have many. I absolutely love Harry Potter!" People laughed again, "Shocking I know, but recently I've fallen in love with an old classic, Great Expectations."

Emily felt her heart beat a little faster, staring at Alison with affection she realised that the blonde wasn't the only one falling for things recently. The thought scared her a little bit, she couldn't ever remember feeling like this about someone so quickly.

When the questions were over Alison walked off stage to applause and cheers. Emily clapped enthusiastically with them.

"You're such a dork." Alison laughed as she reached her.

"Thank you so much for that, it was truly inspiring. The young people here will have taken a lot away from it." Veronica gushed.

"Yeah and hopefully the old people here will get out their check books." Spencer said from behind them. "Are you staying for a drink Em?"

Emily looked at Alison, it would be her decision.

"Yes, we'll stay for one." Alison smiled.

"Can I steal her for a second?" Spencer asked the socialite.

"Actually I have to stay with her, it's kind of my job Spence." Emily answered for her.

"Go have a drink with your friend Fields, I'm sure there's enough security at this event to keep me out of trouble." She replied, putting her hand on Emily's arms sending tingles through it.

"Great, see you soon." Spencer said dragging Emily toward the open bar. "So, how long has that been a thing?"

Emily choked on the drink she'd just taken a mouthful of, "Have you been talking to Aria and Hanna?"

"Well I've spoken to them but not about this, seriously I'm the last to know?!" Spencer said with jokey annoyance.

"You can't say anything to anyone Spence!" Emily warned.

"You know me better than that Em."

"How did you know?" Emily was curious how she had figured it out without a heads up from the others.

"Well you're not exactly subtle, anyone that knows you knows that look you've been giving her all night. Also the fact that you got her to agree to this means you must have some pull in her life." Spencer said taking a sip of her own drink.

"Hey Em, Spencer."

Emily turned to see Paige standing at the bar. Now this she was not expecting, luckily Spencer wasn't frozen into silence like she was.

"Paige, I didn't see your name on the list?" Spencer narrowed her eyes, she had never like Emily's ex much, none of them had.

"It wasn't, but I'm here scouting and the coach mentioned that Alison was speaking at the event tonight so I thought it would be fun. I'm their plus one, in a strictly professional way." She added looking at Emily.

"Well it was nice to see you." Spencer said in a dismissive tone that suggested she should leave now.

"So Emily," Paige turned her full attention to her, "you're seeing someone?"

"Yes she is."

Emily turned to see Alison had made her way over, and she did not look happy. Paige opened her mouth to speak again

"In fact we should be leaving, I'm sure your girlfriend is missing you. You should get home to her. It's unfair for me to keep you out all night." Alison said to Emily. "It was lovely to meet you Spencer."

"Yeah you too." Spencer was watching the whole exchange looking rather amused, Emily shot her a look.

"See you soon I hope." Emily hugged the sniggering brunette then followed Alison, messaging Carter to bring the car round.

Once they were home and inside Alison started the argument she knew she'd wanted the whole way back.

"You could have given me a heads up that she'd be there." Alison spat angrily as she stalked into the living room.

"Honestly Ali I didn't know!" Emily tried to explain the situation. "I was as surprised as you were."

"Last minute? Fun to hear me speak? Let's not pretend that she didn't know you were going to be there!"

"I can't control where she goes Ali!" Emily was getting annoyed, why couldn't the blonde see that Paige wasn't a threat. Not that her and Alison were even together.

"I just really hate her!" Alison sat on the couch and put her head in hands.

"Why? Why do you hate her so much?" Emily asked softly.

"I don't even know. I just feel like she really wants you back." Alison spoke, head still in her hands.

"What are we doing here Ali?" Emily finally voiced her internal questions, needing to know where they stood.

"Do we have to speak about this right now?" Alison still didn't look up at her.

"No, I best be going though. Apparently I have a girlfriend at home that's been missing me all night." Emily couldn't keep the bitter tone out of her voice. It made Alison finally look up.

"Do we have to put a label on this? Why can't it just be what it is?" Alison asked.

"But that's just it, what is this?" Emily threw her hands in the air with exasperation.

"It's fun." Alison shrugged her shoulders.

"Fun?" Emily replied, hurt.

"Not like that fun!" Alison back tracked, "It's…we have fun, I like you, I don't want you having fun with anyone else…we are exclusive fun."

"Exclusive fun?" Emily couldn't help but laugh, "That's a thing is it?"

"It is now." Alison smiled back, "Look I'm not ready to…can we just be exclusive fun?"

Emily understood that this was a huge step for the girl in front of her, accepting she would have to give her some time she sighed, "Sure, exclusive fun it is."

"Great, now come cuddle me." Alison held her arms out and Emily complied, shifting them on the couch so that the smaller girl was snuggled up to her with her head on her chest.

"So I realised tonight that I don't really know much about you." Emily spoke, "I think we should play the question game again."

"Okay, but I get to go first." Alison nodded against her chest.

"Okay, ask away." Emily braced herself for whatever Alison was going to come up with, she was not prepared for it though.

"How many people have you been with?"

"Ali come on!" Emily sat up, forcing the blonde up also.

"The rules are anything and you have to answer." Alison argued.

"But really? That?" Emily wasn't happy about the direction the night was taking.

"Is it that many?!" Alison took her refusal badly.

"It just doesn't matter." This wasn't a conversation that Emily wanted to have.

"Well if it doesn't matter then tell me."

"Well how many have you been with?" Emily fired back.

"Two." Alison replied quickly. "Both men, and before you ask one of them wasn't Elliot Rollins. I thought he was being sweet and old fashioned wanting to wait until we were married. Turns out my lawyer thinks he just didn't want to risk a longer sentence."

"Two, oh wow, okay." Emily rubbed the back of her neck.

"Jesus Emily, how many is it?" Alison stared at her wide eyed.

Emily had never had to count them up before, it wasn't something she'd ever really thought about. Once she was in the army she'd had quite a lot of one night stands she wasn't exactly proud of.

"Errm six that mattered." Emily hoped her answer would suffice, she didn't want to get into this.

"So a lot is what you're saying?" Alison asked, not angrily, Emily couldn't read her emotions right now.

"Yeah, look I've had a lot of one night stands I'm not proud of okay."

"Okay."

"Okay?" Emily was shocked at how well Alison was taking this conversation.

"Yeah, it's your past. People change."

"That is true." Emily smiled leaning in to gently kiss the beautiful blonde.

"So how long has it been since you…?" Alison asked when she'd pulled away.

"Are we really doing this?" Emily sighed.

"It's been four years for me." Alison said looking away, "It was a guy I dated in college. He tried to sell a story about me after, I became very careful after that."

"What a dick." Emily voiced her anger.

"Yeah well, I mean I've dated quite a lot since then but you have to be pretty damn special to make it into my bed. So you?" Alison asked again.

Knowing that Alison was opening up and sharing with her Emily knew it was only right she be honest with her too.

"Three months. There was a girl in a different unit, Samara. It wasn't anything serious, just…well relief I guess." Emily looked down feeling embarrassed.

"Have they all been girls?"

"Yeah, I had a boyfriend in high school but nothing ever happened. I was just trying to fit in."

Alison snuggled back in to her again. "Thank you for being honest with me."

"Likewise." Emily kissed the top of her head and pulled her to lay down thinking that they might not play this game again.

They must have fallen asleep like that, Emily was woken by her phone chiming. Alison stirred in her arms but stayed asleep. She picked it up to check the message.

'Nice seeing you and your girlfriend tonight. Although she lied when she said she was at home. Really Emily? I thought you had better taste, well I'm done. I hope you enjoy being a dirty secret. Next time she wants to keep it tell her not a piss on you in public.'

Paige knows? Shit! She should have known, Spencer said anyone that knows her could see. Why wasn't she more careful? Not that Alison exactly helped with by basically marking her territory. Paige wouldn't say anything though, Emily was sure she wouldn't. She was a lot of things but that wasn't her style. Deciding that she'd only be worrying Alison for no reason she hit delete. Before scooping the sleeping girl up and carrying her to bed.

When she woke up the next morning Emily decided that she had made the right decision. Things were going well with her and Ali, why rock the boat for no reason? They had a party to go to that night. A 'ball' actually, according to Alison it was a big deal. A big enough deal that apparently it would take all day to get ready for. Emily had decided to keep out of the way, taking the garment bag Ali had given her with a 'casual, smart outfit that will help you fit in but still do your job' home to get ready. Hanna was far more excited about this whole thing than she was. Apparently this was a huge deal.

"So when do I get to meet her?" Hanna was sat on her bed as she got ready.

"Probably never." Emily replied finishing her make up.

"You're a terrible best friend. You have access to my hero and you let Aria and Spencer meet her but not me!"

"Oh yeah, those meetings were completely orchestrated to leave you out." Emily dead panned, going to put her hair up.

"Leave it down and straight. I've looked at your outfit, it'll go better."

"It's a pantsuit." Emily sighed.

"No, it's a Valentino jumpsuit."

"Whatever."

"No, not whatever. Alison obviously wants you to look nice and I will not let my future bestie down." Hanna stared her down.

"For the love of God Hanna, fine!" Emily gave in.

"YES!" Hanna jumped off the bed in glee and picked up Emily's make up bag.

"I just did that."

"Not for a Valentino jumpsuit you didn't." Hanna said in the most serious tone Emily had ever heard her use. What had she let herself in for?

She arrived at Alison's just as the team were leaving. Getting out of the car she told Carter she'd be back in a minute with the socialite. Alison was already stood at the door though when she opened it.

"Holy shit." Emily breathed out. Ali looked stunning, her signature hair curled to perfection, her cap-sleeved sequinned gown fitting her perfectly in all the right places. Emily wanted to tell Carter to leave and take her back inside and do things she definitely didn't want the blonde to know she was thinking about right now.

"I could say the same." Alison smiled at her, "I knew Hanna would make you glam up."

"Then I've spoken too much about her." Emily rolled her eyes.

"You look amazing Em." She said as they walked to the car.

"Thanks, not sure how I'm meant to tackle people in these heels though."

"Just take them off." Alison replied as though it was obvious, "I was going to send a dress but then I knew you'd complain you couldn't run at all."

"That is true." Emily said as she opened her door for her to get in.

They had just set off when Emily noticed the slight tear where her sleeve met the body of her dress.

"Errm Ali, I think there's a problem." She said pointing it out.

"Oh my God! Are you fucking kidding me! I said to Enzo, I said I heard a rip, he said there wasn't one! Fucking liar! He will never work again! What the fuck am I meant to do?! Carter turn back, we're going home!" Alison was in full rant mode.

Emily knew what to do but she really didn't want to. For fucks sake she sighed internally.

"Carter take us to my place please."

"What? Why?" Alison questioned, still clearly very angry.

"Because I have a Hanna." Emily smiled taking the blondes hand and rubbing circles to try and calm her.

"Brace yourself." Emily warned as she opened the apartment door. "Han?" She called out.

"Why the hell are you back?" Hanna came into view from the kitchen, clearly in her pyjamas.

"Hi." Alison smiled shyly, was she nervous about meeting Hanna? The thought made Emily laugh.

"Oh wow." Hanna stood in shock. "Em this isn't what I meant earlier."

"You said you wanted to meet your 'hero'" Emily put emphasis on the last word, if Hanna was getting her own way she was going to make it as awkward as possible for her.

"Not in my fucking pyjamas." She said through gritted teeth.

"I have a wardrobe malfunction and Emily here seems to think you're going to be my saviour." Alison addressed the still frozen blonde.

"Alison Lauren DiLaurentis just call me Jesus, what's your problem?"

Oh great, Emily thought, she's back to being herself again.

"You know my middle name." Alison replied.

"Honey I know your bra size, now what's the issue?" Hanna was in her element.

"Errm my strap…really my bra size?" Alison seemed a little taken aback by Hanna, most people were Emily noted.

"Come into the living room and I'll grab my stuff." Hanna ran off to her room.

"Well she is…" Alison laughed.

"Yeah she is." Emily agreed.

Less than five minutes later and the problem was no more. She was pretty damn good, Emily had to hand it to her.

"Next fashion week you are totally my date." Alison said throwing her arms around the other blonde, who hugged back eagerly.

"This is the best day of my life, and I'm engaged, just saying." Hanna gushed.

"Yeah yeah, you worship her we get it. Come on Ali, let's leave before she gets out her magazines for you to sign." Emily teased.

"Shut up, although a follow on Twitter wouldn't hurt?" Hanna smiled at Alison sweetly.

"You got it." Alison laughed, "I'll get Em to give me all your social media accounts, I bet your Instagram is fantastic."

"Come on, before you two actually make friends." Emily joked, but internally it was becoming a genuine concern.

They were heading out the door when Hanna said it. It had all been going far too well, Emily knew it had to happen eventually. Foot in the mouth Hanna was inevitably going to show up at some point.

"Give me a call about fashion week, finally Em got herself a girlfriend with some useful connections."

Emily turned to glare at Hanna in horror, she however still had a smile plastered to her face.

"Will do." Alison called behind her, before throwing Emily a death stare.

Not wanting to argue in front of Carter they hadn't spoken since the apartment. They continued not to speak once they arrived. In fact they were now halfway through the ball and they still hadn't spoken. Emily was stood on the sidelines, having to watch Alison flirt with far too many male celebrities for her liking. The first couple she knew Ali was just doing to piss her off, so she had brushed it off. Now though she was actually starting to get pissed off, but she'd never let Alison see that. It wasn't until she was slow dancing with some Hollywood actor that it really started to hurt Emily. Not because she was flirting, Emily knew she wouldn't actually do anything, that she wasn't really interested. It was because Emily realised she would never get to do that with her. Swallowing her feelings down, she stood stoically for the rest of the night doing her job.

They didn't talk the rest of the event, they didn't talk on the ride home, they didn't talk on the way to the door. Emily was about to turn to leave when Alison's hand grabbed hers and pulled her inside. Shutting the door behind them she walked into the kitchen and pulled out a bottle of wine and two glasses. Emily had noticed she'd not drank at all during the ball, pouring a drink into each she silently handed one to Emily and walked through to the living room. Emily followed behind. Alison sat down on the couch and downed half her glass before finally speaking.

"Who knows?" Her voice was low and calm.

"Hanna, Aria and Spencer." Emily answered unnerved by Alison's demeanour.

"Did you tell them?" Alison was unreadable.

"Hanna yes. Aria and Spencer guessed." Emily replied honestly, still waiting for the eruption.

"Do you trust them?" Why wasn't she yelling?

"With my life." Emily meant that completely.

"Okay." Alison answered.

It was now or never, she had prepared herself for an argument so she might as well get it out of the way.

"And Paige." Emily flinched as she said it.

Alison downed the rest of the glass, "You told Paige?" Her face was now readable, and it was livid.

"No, actually you did." Emily replied.

"I most certainly did not!" Alison raised her voice for the first time.

"She text me after the education thing saying something about you pissing on me in public."

"Did you confirm it?" Alison asked, her voice normal volume again. Emily could see her beating herself up internally.

"No, I just deleted the text." Emily answered, wishing she'd just told her at the time now.

"Good. I mean, not good she said it, but she has no proof. To sell the story to anyone credible she'd have to have something."

"I don't think she would do that." Emily didn't want to believe her ex was capable of that.

"Yeah well people will surprise you." Alison took Emily's untouched glass out of her hand and took a sip.

"Yeah they will." Emily agreed, staring at the blonde. She couldn't believe how well that all went.

"Don't look at me like that, I've had the whole night to get angry and then calm myself down. Believe me at one point I was planning where I was going to hide your body." She took another drink, "Plus the alcohol helps."

"Really you had time to do all that AND give half of Hollywoods leading men hope that they had a chance with you?" Emily couldn't help herself, it had pissed her off.

"Call it even?" Alison smirked at her.

"Yeah sure." Emily said not meeting her eyes.

"What's wrong?" Alison's face was serious again now. "I thought I was being mad at you?"

"I'm not mad, it's just," Emily tried to gather her thoughts, "is it always going to be like this?"

"Like what?" Alison cocked her head.

"A dirty secret." Emily looked at her.

Alison looked down, "You're not a dirty secret Em, yes it's a secret. Although apparently not a well kept one, but it's not dirty. This is just a difficult situation for me. If you can't do it then I understand."

"I can do it," Emily sighed, "but it's hard for me too. The worst part of the whole night for me was knowing that I was never going to be able to dance with you. I know that's a stupid little thing. I don't even know if that's something that people having 'exclusive fun' do, but it bothered me tonight."

"I think that's something that they do." Alison said softly standing up. "My iPod is on the dock, press shuffle."

"You want to dance here?" Emily asked a little shocked.

"Is where we dance important? Is it that you want people to see us dance or do you just want to dance with me?" Alison questioned.

"Right now I just want to dance with you." Emily answered honestly.

"Then press shuffle."

Emily walked over to the iPod and pressed the button, she walked back over to Alison as the sound of a piano started. Reaching her hand out to her she noticed the blonde was blushing furiously.

"Is everything okay?" Emily asked, confused, Alison didn't seem nervous when she was dancing earlier.

"Everything is perfect." Alison almost whispered as she put her arms around Emily's neck, placing her head below her chin.

Emily put her arms around the shorter girls waist, resting her head on top of Ali's. They started to move slowly to music, and Emily finally realised what song was playing, listening to the lyrics as they danced.

'Shall I stay? Would it be a sin? For I can't help falling in love with you…'

"Yeah, it is." Emily whispered back placing a soft kiss on the top of Ali's head.

 **So that's what I wrote, who knew eh? As usual all of your thoughts are greatly appreciated, it's always nice to be spoken to. Unless you're on public transport with your headphones in, nobody needs chatter in their lives at that moment. If you don't want to review the story why not tell me a joke? As always much love to you all :)**


	9. Chapter 9

**Well hello there! We have passed 200 reviews! What the hell is that all about?! I celebrated last night with a few drinks, well it was my friends birthday, and I was the only one celebrating writing successfully about fictional characters, but still it was a good time. I also celebrated by writing the rest of this chapter. So you may have noticed the rating has changed. We are now in M territory. I think it's still pretty tame really though compared to some weird shit out there. To the guest who asked if I can promise that I'm going to finish this story and update now and then, yeah I can promise that pal. Anyway, on with the show...**

Alison couldn't help the spring in her step and the smile on her face as she made her way downstairs that morning. She couldn't even pretend it had nothing to do with the fact that a certain brunette would be arriving in the next hour. Things with her and Emily were going well. Actually they were great. Yes they'd had a few rocky moments, she wasn't exactly thrilled with finding out just how many people knew about them, but they had moved past it. This was the healthiest relationship she'd ever had with anyone. It was the happiest she could ever remember being in her life, and yet it was the biggest secret she had ever kept. She knew that Emily was struggling with that. Part of her wished that it didn't have to be that way, but the alternative scared her more than anything ever had. Emily was everything she had ever looked for in a person. She was kind, smart, funny, incredibly thoughtful and hot as hell. She was also a woman, that was something she hadn't looked for. She'd never even looked at another woman in that way, but Emily honestly turned her on more than anyone she'd ever met. To say she was confused by this was an understatement, but as time went on she had made a decision not to overthink it and just try to be happy with her happiness. How could she expect her family to come to terms with her new relationship though if she didn't even understand it herself? Her family had never shown any signs of homophobia in the past, but something told her that they would be less okay with it when it was one of their own. She was broken out of her thoughts by the sound of her phone alerting her that she had a text.

'Hey it's Hanna, I stole your number from Em's phone hope you don't mind. I would have called but I figured you wouldn't answer an unknown caller. So as I'm sure you know, it's Em's birthday on Saturday. Me and the girls want to take her out for the day and do drinks and karaoke. She said you guys didn't have any plans but I just wanted to check you weren't doing a surprise thing. Let me know, you're more than welcome to come out with us if not. Much love, your future bestie X'

It was Emily's birthday in two days? Why hadn't she told her? The brunette hadn't even given any inclination that it was coming up. Why hadn't she ever asked her when it was? Of course she had a birthday, everyone did, she'd never even thought to ask her about it. What the hell was she going to get her? Realising that she needed to let Hanna know that she didn't have anything planned as she had to spend Saturday at the office with her father, not to mention she didn't even know about it, she quickly messaged her back.

'Hi Hanna, I don't mind you having my number. Just protect it please. I don't have anything planned, you guys should go out and have fun. I have to work so I won't be able to come. The future sounds interesting, Alison X'

She got a reply only seconds later.

'Okay great, sucks that you can't come. Don't fight it Ali D, it will happen. Hanna X'

Laughing at the reply she placed her phone back down and started to rack her brains for ideas of what to get Emily. Money wasn't an object, but she wanted the gift to be thoughtful.

"Morning!" Emily's voice rang out as she entered the kitchen and came over to her handing her a coffee and placing a sweet kiss on her lips.

"Why didn't you tell me it was your birthday?" Ali asked, not even bothering with a proper greeting.

"You never asked." Emily shrugged with a smile, "It's not a big deal."

"Of course it's a big deal, you were born, that's a big deal." Ali replied.

"Well yeah I guess you're right, I am kind of a big deal. I'm just glad you think so too." Emily playfully wiggled her eyebrows as she sipped her coffee.

"You should have told me." Alison remained serious.

"I'm sorry?" Emily pouted, "How'd you find out anyway?"

Alison just looked at her.

"Ah, Hanna." Emily grimaced.

"Yeah, I suppose it helps if my future bestie actually has my number." Alison joked, surprisingly not bothered by the other blondes espionage.

"Well I can tell you now, you will regret saying that." Emily said, closing her eyes and shaking her head.

"Well she seems nice."

"Yeah she does seem that way." Emily warned with a smile.

"Anyway I've told her to take you out with the girls for drinks and karaoke. Can't wait to see the videos of that." Alison mocked.

"Oh there will be no singing from me, there will be no video evidence at all." Emily waved her hands for emphasis.

"Oh don't disappoint me now." Alison made a sad face.

"I don't plan to, which is exactly why I won't be singing." Emily leaned forward to kiss the pout off her lips.

Alison grabbed her by the neck before she could pull away again and deepened the kiss, only pulling away when they had both run out of oxygen.

"Wow," Emily breathed out, "what was that for?"

"Do I need a reason?" Ali asked, her head still swimming from the sensation of kissing the tanned beauty.

"God I hope not." Emily grinned, before leaning in to claim her lips again.

This time they were broken apart by Pepe's whine.

"I think someone is getting jealous." Emily said giving him a scratch behind the ears.

"I think someone is ready for their morning walk." Ali stood up to go get his lead.

"You're right, I am. Do you want to come too boy?" Emily joked, getting up and following Alison.

There were few things in life that brought Alison as much joy as being out walking Pepe. Kissing Emily Fields was one of those joys, but being out at the park with her two favourite people was definitely high on the list. She had to make a conscious effort not to be as handsy with Emily out in public though. All it would take was one photo of her with her arm linked through the brunettes, snuggled up to her side like she wanted to be, and her whole world would come crashing down.

"Is there anything you want for your birthday?" Alison asked casually as they took it in turns to throw Pepe sticks.

"Nope." Emily answered as she launched the piece of wood across the park.

"Nothing at all?" Alison tried again, she was really struggling with ideas.

"Well there is one thing." Emily said, turning to her.

"Anything you want." Ali smiled up at her.

"I know you're working during the day and I'm seeing the girls, but I would like to spend the last part of my birthday with you." She answered moving a stray piece of hair from Alison's face.

"I'd like that too." Alison grinned, picking up the stick and throwing it again.

It had taken her all night on the Internet and well into the small hours but she had finally found the perfect gift for Emily. A first edition of Great Expectations, apparently it was published in three volumes originally, and finding all three in good condition had been a task. It had come with a hefty price tag but Emily was more than worth it. A courier would be delivering it that afternoon. Alison felt nervous, she really hoped she'd like it. She just hoped Emily wouldn't question the packages arrival when it came. They were sat on the couch watching a film while Alison checked her emails. There was a very unwelcome one from Karen, informing her that she was to attend a family meal Saturday night after working with her father.

"You have got to be kidding me!" Alison slammed the lid of her laptop shut.

"What's wrong?" Emily jumped at the noise.

"My family." Alison fumed, why do they always have to ruin everything?

"What have they done now?"

"I have to go to a stupid meal tomorrow night, which means I won't be able to spend the night with you on your birthday!" Ali knew there was no getting out of it without raising too many unwanted questions.

"So we'll just hang out later than planned, it's fine." Emily put her arms around her and kissed her head.

"It's not fine Em, it's your birthday." Alison felt terrible.

"Babe it's not a problem, I'll be here waiting when you get home."

Alison couldn't help the feeling she got in her chest when Emily used the term of affection, she loved it.

"You might just be the most understanding person in the world, do you know that?" Ali snuggled into her.

"Well I don't know if you've heard, but I'm kind of a big deal." She could hear the smirk in Emily's voice.

Tilting her face up to kiss the smirk away she pulled back and smiled warmly at the cocky woman, "Yeah, you really are."

What the hell she did to deserve this woman she would never know.

Alison was in the bathroom when Emily shouted her.

"There's a delivery at the door that apparently only you can sign for."

Rushing down Alison saw Emily stood in the hallway with the box in her arms, the delivery man waiting impatiently to get a signature. It wasn't until she reached the door that he finally seemed to recognise her.

"Well hey there, can I get your autograph?" He held out the electronic pad with a look in his eyes that Alison knew far too well.

Alison took the pad off him and quickly signed, handing it back with a thanks.

"How about I get your number too?" He obviously thought his forward flirting was charming.

"How about I don't report you to your company?" Alison crossed her arms and stared him down.

"Woah calm down, just thought I'd ask." He held his arms up in surrender. "Enjoy your books, saw you as more of a Cosmo girl than a Dickens but to each their own. Clearly you have 'Great Expectations' though." He looked like he was waiting for a laugh.

Instead Alison slammed the door in his face.

"Great Expectations?" Emily asked, looking down at the package she was still holding.

"Well you might as well just open it now. That asshole has ruined the surprise anyway." Alison snapped.

"I'm sorry was he the asshole or me?" Emily raised her eyebrow.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to speak to you like that. I'm just annoyed that he ruined your present." She walked over to Emily and smiled. "Happy Birthday Em."

Emily took the parcel into the living room to open it. She sat on the couch and pulled open the box. Alison stood watching for her reaction.

"Oh my God Ali are these first editions?" Emily stared up at her wide eyed.

"They are, I didn't know what to get you and I wanted it to be special. It's the only thing I really know you love so…"

Emily put the box down on the floor next to her, "Come here."

Alison walked over to her and Emily pulled her forward onto her lap so that she was straddling the brunette.

"That is hands down the best present I have ever got, thank you." Her eyes were full of gratitude, and something else Alison was a little afraid to see.

"You're welcome." Alison replied, putting her hands into her soft dark hair and kissing her soundly on the mouth.

Emily didn't let her pull away though, instead her hands grabbed Ali's ass as she pulled her closer, deepening the kiss. Alison couldn't help but moan as Emily squeezed her backside, the next thing she knew she was on her back on the couch, Emily hovering over her.

"You are incredibly thoughtful." Emily leaned down to kiss her, "and sweet," another kiss, "and lovely," she leaned in again, "and so damn beautiful."

Alison didn't let her pull away this time, instead grabbing her neck with one hand, the other on her back, and kissing her passionately. Emily had one hand on the couch, holding herself up as not to put all her weight onto Ali. Her other hand cupping Alison's cheek. Suddenly feeling brave, and incredibly turned on, Ali let the hand on her back slide lower until it was on the brunettes behind. Giving it a squeeze, Emily moaned into her mouth. This spurred her on, grabbing it and pulling so that Emily's hips were flush with her own.

"Fuck Ali." Emily started kissing and nipping at her jaw.

Alison just moaned in response, wrapping her legs around the brunettes waist, pulling her closer. She felt like her whole body was on fire, Emily's hand moved from her cheek and found its way to her breast, palming it roughly. Alison ran her hand through Emily's hair, pulling so that their lips found each other again. Tongues wrestling for dominance. Then Emily's hand was under her shirt, rubbing her thumb over lacy material that was the only thing that separated it from her now hard nipple. Alison's hips bucked of their own accord and Emily ground her hips down hard. Alison hissed with pleasure, she didn't even remember sex feeling this good. Suddenly needing to feel more of the woman on top of her, she moved both her hands down to the hem of the brunettes shirt and tugged. Emily raised herself up slightly to comply when they heard the front door slam.

"Alison dear are you home?" Martha's voice sang out from the hallway.

She quickly pushed Emily off her and scrambled up off the sofa, trying to fix her appearance to that of someone that wasn't just making out like a horny teenager.

"Yeah, I'm just in here." Her voice didn't sound like her own.

Martha popped her head around the door, mischief in her eyes. "I'll just get on with the washing dear, don't mind me."

When she had gone Ali breathed out a sigh of relief and turned to look at Emily who looked like she'd just been told there was no Santa.

"That was too close." Ali shook her head, not wanting to think about what she might have walked in on.

"When did you say she was retiring again?" Emily asked, a frown on her face.

Ali couldn't help but giggle, "I told you, I don't think she will."

"Well then how about she cuts down her hours?"

Ali just shook her head and swatted the clearly disappointed girls arm. Who got up and picked up her present.

"Where are you going?" Alison asked confused.

"Home, I need a really cold shower." She chuckled with a blush on her cheeks.

"I'm sorry sweetie," Alison walked up to her and placed a soft kiss to her lips, "See you tomorrow night?"

"You will indeed." Emily kissed Ali's forehead and then turned to leave.

Ali couldn't resist slapping her ass as she walked away, "Have a great birthday."

Emily turned her head, that look in her eyes again. "It's already beaten every other one I've had." Then she was out the door.

Alison shut it behind her and leaned onto it, putting her head back and closing her eyes, her heart still racing. A feeling of loss at the girls departure, this was more than 'exclusive fun', what the hell was Emily Fields doing to her?

Alison hated working in the office with her father. This was not the future she wanted, she didn't want to be posing for magazine covers forever, but this wasn't the alternative career choice for her. She laughed internally at her use of the word choice, because she didn't have one. This was it. She had once tried to tell her father that she didn't want anything to do with the business, he had calmly told her that all her accounts would be frozen until she reconsidered. It didn't take long. After what seemed like the longest day she had ever had, her father told her that they were calling it quits and heading to dinner. Alison was glad it was finally over. Usually she had no problem with any of the work expected of her, today though she wasn't taking anything in. To say she was distracted was an understatement, her thoughts never strayed from a certain tanned brunette for long enough to actually concentrate on anything. All she wanted to do was go home and be with her, the truth was she missed her far more than she should.

"Are you ready to go?" Her father asked, picking up his briefcase and heading to the elevator.

"Yeah, where are we eating?" Alison hoped when they'd said meal, what they really meant was 'quick bite to eat'.

"Home." Her father replied, leaving Alison stunned. They never had meals at home, unless it was a special occasion.

"Home?" She queried, hoping it was just the name of some new restaurant.

"Yes, your brother is coming and he's just recovered from a lapse. I don't want anywhere with alcohol." Her father entered the elevator.

Great, not only did she have to sit through a family meal, but there would be no alcohol to help her through it. Hoping Emily was having a better time than she was, she let out a sigh as the doors shut.

As she'd expected the meal was not enjoyable. It was long, awkward and uncomfortable. She looked at her phone for the millionth time. No messages. She had made a decision not to text Emily, not wanting to ruin her birthday by moaning about her own terrible night. Or distracting her from having well deserved fun with her friends. Not that she wasn't constantly thinking about the fun she might be having. She half expected to find out that Paige had shown up, the thought alone drove her crazy. A text conversation that she had with Hanna earlier in the day though suggested that none of Emily's friends were fans of that particular ex. That had made her happier than it perhaps should have. She'd actually quite enjoyed the chat with Hanna, it was just mindless chatter but it made Alison realise why Emily had her for a best friend.

"So, Alison. How have you been?" Jason asked from across the table, clearly trying to make noise in yet another uncomfortable silence.

"Good thanks." Alison smiled, because honestly for the first time of being asked that question by him at one of these dinners, she actually had been.

"Wow good?" Jason pulled a face of surprise. "I've never known you to be anything other that 'fine' for twenty-five years."

"Yes well now I'm good." She said sipping her water and praying the dessert would show up soon, it was already nine o'clock.

"So, do you have a boyfriend?" Jason was just Mr Chatty tonight she thought with annoyance.

"Nope." She answered, it wasn't a lie.

"Please Jason, don't make jokes at the dinner table." Jessica laughed coldly.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Alison looked at her mother, eyes challenging her.

"Oh nothing dear, speaking of which, Leona Vanderwaal was telling me about this wonderful new personal trainer that Mona has taken on."

"How is that a speaking of?" Alison couldn't help the anger in her voice.

"Alison don't talk to your mother like that. She's just making conversation, something you haven't been doing all night." Her father chastised. "In fact you've been strange all day."

"Thank you Kenneth." Jessica looked at her coldly.

Feeling her phone vibrate in her hand she looked down to see Hanna was trying to FaceTime her.

"Excuse me a moment." She said getting up from the table.

"You're being rude Alison." Kenneth called after her.

"I'll be two minutes." She called over her shoulder as she headed upstairs out of ear shot.

She entered one of the bathrooms and swiped to answer.

"Ali D!" Hanna's voice sang out as she came into view.

"Hey Hanna, how's your night?" Ali couldn't help but laugh at the clearly drunk blonde.

"It's great! Emily keeps trying to escape but we won't let her, seriously she's had like two drinks. It's her birthday, help us make her do shots!" Hanna complained.

"Oh I don't think anyone can make Emily do something she doesn't want to." Ali giggled, wishing she were there instead of here.

"I thought you'd say that. Anyway we've managed to come to an agreement where she has to do one song and then we'll leave her alone and let her go home."

"Well that's very kind of you, make sure you film it for me okay?"

"Oh don't worry, you'll get to see it!" She heard Spencer's voice as the lawyer came into shot.

"Hey Spencer." She greeted.

"So just a quick question, Every breath you take, creepy threat by a stalker or sweet love song by a bodyguard?" Hanna came back into view.

"Errm, the second one?" Ali answered confused.

"I told you!" Aria's head popped into shot, "I told them!"

"Hey Aria." She greeted, very confused now.

"Well then get ready Ali D because this ones for you!" Hanna grinned triumphantly.

The next thing she knew her phone displayed Emily stood on stage, microphone in hand, looking very uncomfortable. She looked directly at the camera.

"I swear to God Marin you better not be recording this! That was the deal!" Emily shouted angrily.

"I promise I am not recording." She heard Hanna's voice as the camera lowered a little as though she might be hiding the phone. "I'm not lying to her Ali, this is not recording." She heard her whisper into the phone.

"Who are you dedicating it to Em?" She heard Aria shout.

Emily rubbed the back of her neck, "To the giver of my best birthday present."

"Ooo it's for me!" Hanna squealed.

Alison just laughed and then the song started up. She was familiar with it but it had been a long time since she'd heard it. Emily started to sing,

"Every breath you take, every move you make, every bond you break, every step you take, I'll be watching you…"

She wasn't an amazing singer by any means, but to Alison she was perfect. She couldn't help the blush that covered her cheeks. Knowing that Emily was singing about her, not knowing that Alison could hear every word.

"Oh can't you see, you belong to me. How my poor heart aches, with every step you take…"

Did she belong to Emily? She was broken from her thoughts by the cheers and woops of the other girls. Emily finished the song and took an awkward bow to the applause.

"You are welcome." Hanna whispered into the phone, and then she must have ended the call.

She tried to remove the grin that was plastered to her face as she entered the dining room again.

"That was a long two minutes." Her mother scoffed.

"I'm sorry mother. Is dessert ready?" Nothing could put Alison in a bad mood now, she just wanted to get this over with and get home.

"Shocker, I wondered how long it would take you to ask." Her mother baited, a glint in her eye.

"Well you know me." Alison just smiled sweetly. What she wouldn't give to slap her right now.

While they ate dessert her mother suddenly squealed excitedly, "Oh I can't believe I forgot to tell you! You know the Campbell's? Well turns out the eldest son was caught in bed with another man!"

Alison nearly choked on her dessert.

"Are you okay Alison?" Her father asked as she regained her composure.

"I know, shocking isn't it." Jessica's face was covered in glee.

"Does it really matter?" Jason spoke up.

"Of course it matters." Jessica said as though he was stupid.

"But why? Because he's gay? Why does it matter who he finds attractive? Isn't love just love?" Jason continued his point and Alison suddenly found a new respect for her big brother.

"I think you're missing the point Jason." Jessica waved her hand.

"Is the point that you're homophobic?" He glared at his mother.

"Is there something you need to tell us Jason?" Kenneth asked sternly, warning in his voice.

"No Dad, I'm not gay. If I was I'd tell you, I don't give a shit what you think. I just don't see why this is gossip."

"Jason nobody in this family has an issue with gay people." Kenneth stated.

"So long as nobody in this family is gay right?" Jason challenged.

"Well…" Kenneth struggled.

"Yeah that's what I thought, guess you guys got lucky then." Jason continued to eat.

Alison had suddenly lost her appetite. Jason would be on her side, her parents would be exactly who she thought they were.

It was eleven o'clock by the time Carter was finally driving her home. She'd been forced to stay for drinks, which just meant 'mocktails' and more awkward silence. She was just glad these dinners were few and far between. Usually the result of Jason's therapist telling her parents they needed to be a more supportive family. Alison was pretty sure the dinners were actually detrimental to his recovery. She knew they made her want to drink. All she could think about now was how much she missed Emily and how happy she was to be going home to her.

"I'm sorry you're going to get home so late Carter." She apologised to the driver.

"It's not a problem Miss DiLaurentis." He smiled warmly in the mirror. "If I may be so bold, I've never seen you leave that company with a smile on your face before."

Alison laughed, she was pretty sure she hadn't either.

"It's nice to have something to smile about Miss DiLaurentis." He continued, "I don't want to overstep here, but if you find something that makes you smile as much as you have been recently, well you should hold on to that thing with both hands. Some people won't want you to smile, but those people? You like Harry Potter Miss DiLaurentis don't you?"

Alison just nodded silently, wondering where Carter was going with this.

"Those people are like Dementors, they glory in others despair, and they'll suck away all your joy if you let them. You shouldn't let them. If you have found your patronus, use it. It will protect you, if you let it."

She knew exactly what Carter was saying. She couldn't help but chuckle at his analogy, but his meaning was very clear.

Meeting her eyes in the mirror he spoke again, "My daughter is twelve, we just watched all the films."

Alison just nodded again and smiled, "Thank you Carter."

They travelled the rest of the journey in their usual comfortable silence.

Bidding Carter goodnight, she took the steps two at time and hurriedly unlocked the door.

"Em?" She called as she entered. Hearing a muffled shout she headed upstairs.

Entering her bedroom she found Emily on her back on top of the covers, awake but looking very sleepy.

"I'm so sorry I'm this late, I couldn't get away." She explained as she flopped down next to brunette kicking her heels off.

"It's okay," Emily yawned, "how was it?"

"Never mind my night, how was yours? You seem pretty sober."

"Yeah, I only had two drinks. They made me sing." She threw an arm over her eyes in despair.

"They did?" Alison grinned, trying to act like this was new information.

"Yup. They wanted me to do shots, but I didn't want to turn up here wasted so I said no. They agreed to leave me be if I sang one song of their choosing."

"Oh yeah? What was it?" Ali turned on her side, propping her head up on her hand to look at her.

"Oh I don't remember, something cheesy." Emily blushed furiously.

"Well I thought it was beautiful." She couldn't help herself.

"I'm going to kill Hanna!" Emily buried her face into the pillow.

"Don't be mean to my future bestie!" Alison laughed and Emily removed her face from the pillow to glare at her.

"So how was your night?" Emily asked.

"Shit." Alison answered honestly.

"Succinct and to the point." Emily smiled, "Why was it so bad?"

Alison flopped onto her back and yawned, shutting her eyes. The long day finally catching up with her.

"Because my family are assholes, well actually I think my brother is alright, but my parents are dicks. It was long, tedious and awkward. Honestly, I spent the whole night just wishing I was at home with my girlfriend on her birthday." Her eyes shot open at her own words.

Suddenly Emily was hovering over her, "What did you just say?"

She looked up into Emily's eyes, remembering Carter's words. Deciding to give her patronus a chance she answered Emily's questioning gaze, "I said, I just wanted to be home with my girlfriend on her birthday."

Emily kissed her lips gently before pulling away, "Say it again." She whispered.

Alison knew exactly what she wanted to hear, "My girlfriend."

She could feel the smile through Emily's kiss and she couldn't help but match it with her own.

"I was wrong yesterday," Emily spoke through kisses, "This is the best birthday present I have ever got. Ever."

Alison pulled her fully on top of her, revelling in the feeling of Emily's weight pressing down on her. She had never felt happier or safer. Emily provided her with a feeling of security in every sense of the word. Knowing exactly what she wanted for the first time she could remember she slowed their kisses and pulled away.

"Is everything okay? Emily looked down at her concerned.

"It's perfect." She stroked the brunettes cheek before sitting up, forcing the other girl to move off her.

"Do you want to go bed?" Emily seemed puzzled.

"Not exactly, I have one more present." She said, looking at the brunette seductively, before reaching behind her and pulling down the zip on her dress.

Emily visibly gulped, "Are you sure? Just because it's my birthday doesn't mean you have to do anything you don't want to do Ali."

She knew how much Emily wanted this, and the fact she was more concerned about if Alison was ready rather than just jumping her bones, showed her she was making the right decision. Honestly, she really wanted this too.

"I'm more than sure." Alison leaned forward and kissed her sweetly before pulling back and starting to take off her dress. She was stopped by Emily's hands on hers, stilling them. "I'm sure Em." She assured the girl, who was staring at her with lustful eyes.

"I know, but it's my present right? Don't I get to unwrap it?" She smirked at Ali.

"Go right ahead birthday girl." Alison smirked right back.

Emily kissed her again, something felt different. It was like she was putting every feeling she had into the kiss. It was tender and loving. She pulled away and slowly lifted the dress over Alison head before throwing it to the corner of the room. Pushing Alison gently to lay down she straddled her before taking off her own shirt, throwing it to the same corner as the dress. Alison reached up and pulled her in to kiss her again, it was heated and passionate. She reached down to unbutton Emily's jeans, trailing her fingertips down her toned stomach on the way, feeling goosebumps appear as she went. The brunette got up and took them off. Then she looked down and stared at Alison.

"Wow." She breathed out.

"What?" Alison said, suddenly feeling vulnerable laying there in her underwear.

"You are…just wow." Emily smiled before climbing back on top of her again, kissing her like her life depended on it. Ali had never felt more wanted.

The brunette began placing kisses down her jaw as her hand slipped under her back, unclasping her bra and discarding it to the growing pile. Her left hand in Ali's hair, her right moving down to cup her breast, grazing her thumb over the nipple. Alison moaned at the sensation, feeling her core growing wetter by the second. The hand in her hair moved, locking fingers with her own left hand, raising it up. Then she began placing kisses all the way up from her fingertips to her shoulder, before doing the same with her right arm. Alison giggled.

"What are you doing?" She asked Emily.

"There is not an inch of your skin that I don't want to know intimately." Emily smiled, looking her in the eye. Before moving to Alison's chest and kissing her way down between her breasts to her stomach, circling her tongue around her naval. Alison moaned loudly.

"You taste amazing by the way." She felt Emily smile against her stomach before the girl seemed to disappear.

The feeling didn't last long though as she felt kisses up each leg. Always stopping at her inner thigh, just millimetres away from where she needed her. Then she was over her again, nipping her bottom lip before kissing her deeply. Alison's own hands reaching down to explore the tanned girls skin, tracing her sides and slipping into her underwear to grab her by the ass and pull her closer. Emily ground her hips and Alison bucked up to meet her.

"Em." She moaned out her name.

Then she felt a hand graze her stomach before entering her underwear and cupping her.

"Fuck Emily." She hissed, squeezing her eyes shut.

Emily just grinned against her mouth before rubbing her clit with her thumb, Alison unable to stop her hips bucking. Then she was gone again. It didn't take Alison long to figure out why, as her underwear disappeared down her legs. She looked up to see Emily sat up between her legs, removing her own bra and panties. Alison just stared, she was like some kind of tanned goddess. She moved over Alison again, this time taking a nipple in her mouth, while paying the other attention with her hand. Alternating between the two, Alison letting out noises she didn't even know she could make. Her need for the brunette between her legs getting overwhelming.

"Emily please." She gasped.

Emily began kissing down her stomach again and then she felt a warm breath on her most intimate parts. She couldn't help the shudder of anticipation at what was to come. Then her tongue licked right up her length.

"Oh my God, fuck!" Alison moaned out, as Emily got to work.

She had never felt this good in her life. Emily continued kissing and licking as Alison writhed on the bed, one hand gripping the sheet, the other in that soft dark hair. She felt her mouth move away and then a finger replace it, stroking up and down, teasing her before slipping inside her easily. Stopping to look up to check Ali was okay, Emily's eyes met hers. Ali's bottom lip firmly between her teeth she just nodded enthusiastically as Emily began slowly moving inside her, before another was added. She slowed her movements again, allowing Ali to adjust, she looked up into her eyes again waiting for confirmation before slowly resuming her movements. The other hand reaching up to flick a nipple and squeeze her breast. Looking into the brunettes eyes as she moved inside her may have just been the hottest thing she'd ever experienced. Then Emily's mouth was back on her too, sucking her clit as her fingers pumped in and out. Curling in just the right way. She'd had sex before, this was different, it was something far more intimate. Emily wasn't having sex with her, she was making love to her, the thought simultaneously terrified her and made her happier than she thought she could be.

"Fuck Em, I'm so close!" She breathed out, trying to control herself but it was pointless. Emily's fingers really were amazing. She could feel it building and she tugged at the brunettes hair pulling her up so she could feel all of her. Emily complied, moving back up, fingers still pumping in an out, thumb now circling her clit. Alison kissed her messily, loving the feeling of Emily's bare chest against her own and the taste of herself on her tongue. She curled her fingers and hit just the right spot as she threw her head back seeing stars. Chanting Emily's name like a mantra. Emily continued her movements as Alison rode her high out before pulling out of her and placing delicate kisses all over her body, bringing her back down to earth.

"You okay babe?" Emily traced a finger down her cheek as she opened her eyes.

Knowing that forming words was going to be too much of a task right now, Ali just crashed their lips together in response. Scratching her fingers down the brunettes toned back, who hissed and threw back her own head in pleasure.

"Em?" Ali finally found her voice.

"Yes baby?" Emily was back to peppering kisses across her skin.

"I don't think I'm going to be able to make you feel that good." Ali felt the blush of embarrassment across her cheeks.

Emily stopped what she was doing and moved so she was staring into Alison's eyes, "Well first of all, you don't have to do anything you're not ready for. Secondly, trust me, you won't have to do much when you are ready. Thirdly, thank you." She smirked smugly.

Alison swatted her playfully before pushing to roll them over so that she was now on top.

"Seriously Ali," Emily looked up at her sweetly, "we can just go to bed."

"It's your birthday." Ali answered.

"Well technically it's not anymore," she said pointing at the clock, "Even if it was, that is not a reason you have to do anything."

"I want to." Ali blushed shyly, and Emily sat up so that she was now in her lap. Wrapping her arms around.

"Then trust me Ali, you can't go wrong." She pulled her back down with her and started kissing her hungrily.

Alison felt incredibly nervous. She had only ever been with two people, and neither of them had a vagina. Reminding herself that this was Emily, someone who had never made her feel like she wasn't enough, she left the brunettes lips and started placing kisses on her chest. Trying to emulate the feelings that the experienced girl had given her she slowly traced her tongue around one of her nipples, eliciting a moan from the woman under her. Feeling a little more confident she took the whole thing in her mouth before letting it go with a pop.

"Babe, fuck." She heard Emily hiss out. Smiling at the reaction she paid the same attention the other one. Experimentally kneading and massaging with her hand. Spurred on by the noises Emily was making she began to kiss those toned hard abs. Scratching her fingernails down them as she went. Thinking how this might be her second favourite part of Emily's body, after her ass. She has a really great ass, she mused. Finally she settled herself between her girlfriends legs. She couldn't help but feel amused. She, Alison DiLaurentis, had a girlfriend. She was spending her Saturday night between another woman's legs. Part of her wished her mother would walk in right now, she'd probably have a heart attack.

She could see how ready Emily was for her, how much she wanted her. She tentatively licked the length of her. Shocking herself by enjoying the taste. The brunette let out delicious noises as Alison licked her and placed wet kisses between her legs. Trying to copy what Emily had done to her earlier.

Alison stopped what she was doing to look up at Emily, who was staring down at her with that look in her eyes again. "You taste amazing too." She said seductively, as Emily threw her head back onto the pillow, a loud moan escaping her lips as Ali went to suck her clit.

"Baby you can't say shit like that." She gasped out.

"Why not?" Alison hummed against her, causing Emily to gasp again.

"Because you're going to make me embarrass myself." She said, running her hands through Alison's hair.

With a new found confidence at the effect she was having on Emily, she slowly slipped a finger inside her. Moving it tentatively.

"More." She heard Emily pant.

Complying, she slipped another in to join it. Pumping in and out, while trying to rub her clit with her thumb as Emily had done. It wasn't as easy as Emily had made it out to be, her hand soon felt as though it was cramping. She forced her thoughts away from the jealousy that Emily had practiced a lot, focusing on her task. Judging from the sounds the brunette was making, she was doing something right. She heard Emily's breathing get quicker and could feel her tightening around her fingers, something she enjoyed immensely. Moving back up her body while still keeping her hand movements going, she placed sweet kisses on Emily's jaw. The brunettes eyes were tightly shut, a thin layer of sweat covering her body. Alison couldn't resist licking her neck to taste it. That was all it took.

"Fuck, babe, Ali baby!" Emily called out, before grabbing hold of Alison and burying her face into the blondes neck. Kissing and nipping as she rode out her orgasm.

Once she had come down Alison removed her fingers. Looking Emily right in the eye and putting them into her mouth to clean them. Emily's eyes went dark with lust again.

"Are you trying to kill me?" She groaned.

Ali just laughed and kissed the girl, letting her taste herself on her tongue.

"I'll take that as a yes." Emily moaned into her mouth, "Are you sure you've never done that before?"

"I think I would remember." Ali answered laying her head down on Emily's chest, fatigue taking over.

"I know I definitely will." Emily placed a kiss into her hair and wrapping her arms around her. "Best birthday ever."

"Well I'm glad I could make it so great. I still think the highlight for me was your singing." Ali teased, placing a kiss to her girlfriends chest.

"Oh when I see Hanna…" Emily growled.

"That will be in about eight hours." Ali figured she may as well tell her now.

"What do you mean?" Emily sounded confused, "You kicking me out?"

"I'm having brunch with her, she's going to help me with an outfit for the New Years ball. It's your half day tomorrow so you can spend the morning out with us and then spend the afternoon inside me." Ali looked up at her seductively.

Emily stared at her with shocked wide eyes, "You really are trying to kill me." She chuckled and then pouted, "I can't do the afternoon though, my mom's coming to the city to visit me."

Ali couldn't help feeling a little disappointed at knowing she'd have to be apart from her for half the day, but she knew it had been a long time since she'd seen her mom. "Have a nice time with her, you should take her for a nice dinner somewhere. Just let me know where she wants to go and I'll sort you a reservation out. Don't worry about the cost, I'll take care of the bill."

"That's incredibly sweet Ali, but I really couldn't do that."

"Of course you can, your mother deserves it. Just tell her it's your bosses treat for your birthday."

"Why don't you come?" Emily said quietly after a moments silence.

Alison sat up and looked down at her, "You want me to meet your mother?"

"Yeah."

"No." She shook her head firmly.

"Not as my girlfriend, just as my boss. She's always asking about what I do. It would be nice for her to meet you. It's just dinner?" Emily looked at her with those chocolate puppy dog eyes she does so well.

"What happens we're photographed and it hits the gossip sites that I had dinner with my security and her mother?" Alison cocked her head questioningly.

"My mother works for the police department, I'm your security. Just say my mother was freelancing and it was a meeting about security for your next big event. That's the New Years ball right? You're meeting with Hanna about it earlier in the day. It's just a day of meetings for you."

"You have an answer for everything don't you?"

"Yes, yes I do." Emily smirked triumphantly.

"I'll think about it." Alison snuggled back down onto her chest.

"That's all I ask." Emily said wrapping her arms back around her as they fell to sleep.

 **Not going to lie, I finished this last night while I was still under the influence. I am also paying dearly for my sins today. So while you let me know what you think, I am going to get myself a brew and a bacon buttie and try to feel human again. Have a great day, do something kind for someone :** )


	10. Chapter 10

**I know what you're thinking, that was the worlds longest hangover. Rest assured it was not, the tea and bacon sandwich helped immensely and I was back on my feet in no time. Now you're thinking, well where the chuff have you been then? Again I can only blame life, work has been kicking my arse, I went to Ireland, and most recently some prick decided to break into my car. Fun times. The main reason I've not updated though is because every time I have sat down to write, nothing has come out. Or it's come out shit. Thank you for your lovely reviews and to the wonderful sweet person who messaged me a couple of days ago to check in. So here's something new for you to read. Hope it doesn't suck, but let me know. All mistakes are my own as I've been awake for 20 hours now. Prizes for spotting them all ;-)**

Emily had been awake for about an hour, just relishing the feeling of Alison's naked body entangled with her own. They had been up most of the night making love. At least that's what Emily was doing, she couldn't help the growing feelings she had toward the woman in bed with her. She had never fallen for anyone this hard or fast, but there was no denying it, she was falling hopelessly in love with Alison DiLaurentis. Her girlfriend. She still couldn't believe that Ali had said those words, that she'd willingly taken that step. It was impossible to wipe the smile from her face, it made her too giddy to sleep. So she had just lain there, holding her in her arms and placing occasional soft kisses to the top of her head. Not wanting to wake her, she looked so angelic and peaceful when she slept. All of the stress and worry disappeared from her face, it was almost like they were just a normal couple with no cares about the world outside. While she was lost in her thoughts she felt Alison stir and a sleepy face looked up at her.

"Good morning." Ali smiled up at her, eyes still half closed.

"Good morning." Emily returned before placing a gentle kiss to her lips, promising herself that she would never take being able to do that for granted.

"What time is it?" Ali asked, snuggling back into her arms.

"About half past 9." Emily replied, running a hand through her blonde curls.

"Shit!" Alison quickly untangled herself and jumped out of bed, Emily just laid there, enjoying the view.

"Why shit?" She yawned, almost regretting her lack of sleep.

"We're meeting Hanna at 11!" The blonde was now frantically rushing around the room.

"That's not for an hour and a half, you have plenty of time." Emily flopped back down onto her pillow.

"Do you have any idea how long it takes me to get ready?" Alison looked almost comical, hands on her hips, stern look on her face, still completely naked. Emily was having a hard time taking her power stance seriously.

"Actually I do." Emily rolled her eyes, "It's just Hanna though, grab a quick shower and throw some jeans on."

"It's never 'just' anybody," Alison threw her hands in the air, "Inevitably someone will see me and then I'll be splashed all over the Internet looking like shit."

"Alright, alright." Emily conceded sitting up, "Go start mission 'get ready to leave the house'"

Alison just threw her a look as she headed to the bathroom. Figuring she had half an hour before she needed to get up Emily snuggled back into the warm sheets.

"EMILY FUCKING FIELDS!"

Jumping out of bed she ran to the screaming, wondering what the hell had the blonde so irate already.

"What's wrong?" She asked as she entered the room, sleepily rubbing her eyes.

"What's wrong?! What's Wrong?! Look!" Alison tilted her head to the side and pointed out the large love bite that was at the base of her neck.

"Oh." Emily couldn't stop the giggle leaving her mouth.

"You think this is funny?!" Alison was not laughing.

"I'm going to go with no." Emily tried to keep a serious face, she knew she was in big trouble.

"Why? Why would you do that? Why would you do that there?!" Alison was getting angrier by the second.

"Honestly I don't remember even doing it." She rubbed the back of her neck and looked down sheepishly. "I'm sorry Ali."

"Oh well that's okay then, I'll just tell the photographer at my next shoot that you're sorry. I'll just say, my girlfriend said she was sorry, when someone tweets about it. Oh yeah also I have a girlfriend now, so please have a fun writing about that on your gossip sites. This is totally how I wanted that news to come out. That's right it is my security personnel. Of course I'd love to answer a million questions about that!" Ali flew around the room as she spoke, hands waving about.

Emily grabbed her by the shoulders when she came close enough and held her still.

"Baby I am really sorry, it wasn't intentional I promise. Can't you cover it with makeup before you get to your shoot or go out? I mean that stuff cost enough, surely it can hide that." Emily tried desperately to think of a solution.

"I don't actually have a shoot now for a month," Ali mumbled, Emily's shoulders visibly relaxed, "You didn't know that though!" She continued as if sensing Emily's relief.

"I can only apologise," Emily knew she had a lot of work to do to get herself out of this one, "it's just, well you do something to me. I find it very difficult to control myself around you. As soon as I'm near you, all rational thought just seems to leave me. It won't happen again."

Ali's face softened a little at Emily's words, she pulled out of her hold and walked over to the mirror.

"You're lucky it's scarf weather." Alison sighed.

Emily walked over to where she was admiring her handiwork in the mirror. Standing behind the pouting blonde wrapping her arms around her and kissing her neck.

"I'm so sorry." She said between kisses. "I'll make it up to you."

Alison turned in her arms and stared her right in the eye. "You better."

"How about now?" Emily trailed her hands up and down Alison's sides and kissed her passionately.

"I have to shower now." Alison said as she pulled away.

"Exactly." Emily smirked at her suggestively.

Alison freed herself of her embrace and walked over to the shower, stepping in and turning on the water.

'Well so much for that idea' Emily thought before turning to go back to the bedroom.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Emily grinned and headed to join her.

"I am never late to anything." Alison fumed as they finally arrived at the destination Hanna had messaged them to meet for brunch.

Their antics in the shower had set them back quite a bit of time. Not that Emily was bothered, it was completely worth it as far as she was concerned. It did however mean that they were half an hour late.

"Well I didn't hear you complaining earlier." She just smirked back.

The small café was out of the way, Emily had been there with Hanna a couple of times before. She figured she'd picked it because it was low key.

"I am so sorry." Alison greeted as she walked over to the table.

"It's fine, I hope you don't mind but Spencer and Aria are joining us." Hanna smiled.

"No, not at all." Alison smiled in return and greeted the others before taking a seat.

Emily just stood, not really sure if she should sit or not. Technically this was work, she never sat with Alison when they were out. She always sat at another table, or stood out of the way keeping an eye.

"Are you not joining us Em?" Aria asked with a laugh.

"Errm, I'm not sure." She replied, looking to Alison.

"Oh, I hadn't thought about this." Ali looked a little panicked. "I could just say that I'm meeting Hanna about a dress and you introduced us so you sat with us."

"Well yeah you could, because that's exactly what happened." Hanna looked utterly confused.

"The reason that Aria is here is because I'm thinking of hiring her to work the party," Alison's brow was furrowed in thought, "and Spencer is here because…"

"Not that I'm not enjoying you coming up with a backstory for brunch, but have you ever thought that maybe you're a person?" Spencer chuckled.

"I'm sorry what?" Alison asked, not seeming to follow.

"You're a person, people eat. They sometimes do it with friends." Spencer said with a smile.

"Well yeah, I guess they do." Alison conceded, a look on her face Emily couldn't place.

"Great so Em sit down and let's order, I'm starving." Aria gestured to the empty chair.

"So how rough are you feeling today?" Emily laughed as she sat down.

"Oh you have no idea." Hanna groaned. "These two woke me up far too early, fresh as daisies."

"It's not our fault you don't know your limit." Spencer directed at the clearly hungover girl.

"Yeah well I usually have Em to be hungover with, cuddles and Netflix on the couch all day." Hanna stared at her accusingly.

"Well I'm not sorry you're suffering after your betrayal last night." Emily stared accusingly right back.

"Be nice to me, I'm delicate," Hanna pouted, "Ali please tell your girlfriend to be nice to me."

Emily quickly shot Hanna a look, clearly she hadn't got the 'not in public' memo.

"Oh sorry, I forgot you guys weren't labelling things." Hanna mocked.

"Hanna there are people here!" Emily hissed, not daring to look at Alison right now.

"Oh please, nobody even batted an eye when you walked in. They would never in a million years think she'd be in a dive like this. There isn't a person in this room that gives a shit that you two had hot, sweaty sex last night." Hanna sighed.

Emily's mouth dropped open and she felt herself going bright red, she dared to glance at Ali who had the exact same face.

"Wow, I was kidding." Hanna laughed, "But good for you guys."

"Yeah, really happy for you." Aria interjected with sigh, "But seriously I'm wasting away here."

"Ditto." Spencer agreed, "I think I'm going to get the French toast."

If there was one thing that Emily loved about her friends, it was that they really didn't care that she had sex with Alison DiLaurentis last night. Well except Hanna, but lord knows she meant well. Still not daring to look at her girlfriend she started studying the menu intently.

"What are you getting Ali?" Hanna asked looking down at her own menu.

"I'm not sure." Alison stuttered out, still clearly in shock.

"Oh shit, I've made you uncomfortable. I'm sorry." Hanna looked genuinely apologetic.

"Hanna has a habit of saying all her thoughts out loud," Spencer said, throwing Hanna a pointed look, "it never gets endearing, but you get used to it."

Aria reached over the table and took Alison's hand, "You really don't have anything to worry about with us. We're your friends, if you want us of course, we'd never sell you out."

Alison's head shot up at the word friends. She didn't say anything but she returned Aria's smile.

"I think I'm going to get the French toast as well." She smiled at a sheepish looking Hanna.

Emily felt her heart rate return to normal.

The rest of brunch passed pleasantly. In fact Emily couldn't have asked for it to go any better. The conversation flowed freely, Ali and the girls chatted like they'd known each other for years. Just speaking about their lives and normal subjects. There were moments of hysterical laughter, usually at Hanna's expense. A few of Emily's more embarrassing stories got brought up, but Ali just laughed and looked at her affectionately. It really did just feel like friends having brunch.

"So Ali have you thought anymore about that great American novel you wanted to write?" Spencer asked.

"No, well yes, but I haven't written anything." Ali played with her napkin. "When I said that I didn't mean that I was actually going to write a book."

"Do you have a story?" Aria asked, clearly interested.

"Sort of, I mean it's more of an idea at this point."

Alison still doesn't really make eye contact with the other girls. Emily isn't sure if she should turn the subject matter to something else but before she can speak Aria has jumped in again.

"That's how all stories start." Aria smiled, "What's your idea?"

"I'm not really ready to say yet, it's not that great." Emily watches Ali fidget nervously.

"Well there's only one way to find out, write it." Spencer said.

"I'm not sure that I could if I wanted to." The usually confident in public Alison DiLaurentis had disappeared.

"Well having read some of the pieces you wrote in college I would say you could write anything you wanted to." Spencer smiled, sipping her coffee.

"How did you read stuff I wrote in college?" Alison looked up shocked.

"When you said you wanted to write I was intrigued. Your speech was done off the cuff and it was great, so I managed to pull up some of your stuff from when you were at Brown." Spencer just shrugged, "You have a talent Ali, don't waste it."

"Stalk much Spence?" Hanna laughed.

"Says the woman that knows her bra size." Emily joked, earning a laugh from her girlfriend.

"You really think I could write a book?" Alison asked Spencer, Emily could see that the lawyers opinion clearly meant a lot to her. She was happy that Ali finally had some people around her that weren't trying to cut her down.

"Definitely." Spencer said matter of factly.

"I'd buy it." Hanna piped up.

"Well if you could get Hanna to read something that didn't have perfume samples in then you must have some magical powers." Emily couldn't help but poke fun at her best friend.

"Maybe I'll do it then." Alison stopped her nervous fidgeting and looked up at the group.

"A book with your name on the front would be an instant best seller anyway." Aria said with an enthusiastic nod.

"I wouldn't want that," Ali shook her head, "if I was going to write I'd want people to buy it because it was good. So yeah, I guess I'll never know if I can write or not." She shrugged a little sadly.

"You could use a pen name?" Spencer suggested, "I can help you with that from a legal standpoint. Nobody would know it was you."

"Like what?" Ali asked curiously.

"Name an author." Spencer grabbed a napkin and pulled a pen out.

"Vladimir Nabokov?" Ali answered, looking at Spencer with confusion.

"Who?" Hanna was also confused.

"He wrote Lolita." Spencer answered as she wrote on the napkin.

Hanna didn't look any less confused.

"Vivian Darkbloom." Spencer said after a minute.

"What did she write?" Hanna asked.

"We don't know yet." Spencer smiled passing the napkin over to Alison.

"Vivian Darkbloom?" Emily looked at Ali, questioning the name. It kind of suited her in a weird way.

"I like it." Ali said, looking back at Emily, "Although we're getting ahead of ourselves, I haven't actually written anything yet."

"Yet." Aria grinned, "I'm excited for you! If you want any help with editing or a good publisher let me know, my husband is a writer."

Emily felt immense affection for her friends, they had not only accepted Ali into their group, they really were going above and beyond.

"That's very kind, thank you both." Alison grinned back.

"That's what friends are for." Aria replied.

"Yes, and this friend might not be able to help you with words but she is going to make you look hot." Hanna spoke, "Now let's design you a dress!"

She pulled her sketch pad out and stared at Alison wide eyed.

"I'm not really sure what I want, something classy but different. I want to stand out, but in a good way." Ali tried to explain to Hanna.

This was not Emily's thing at all, sure she appreciated a nice dress. She even liked wearing them, but this part of the process bored her. Spencer evidently felt the same way, so they chatted between themselves as Hanna, Aria and Alison started throwing ideas around.

"So?" Emily asked with a raised eyebrow, Alison wasn't the only one that valued the lawyers opinion.

"Yes." Was all Spencer said as she sipped her coffee.

It was all Emily needed, Spencer Hastings approved. That was no easy feat to accomplish, in fact Emily was pretty sure this was the first girlfriend of hers Spencer had actually liked.

After what seemed like forever Hanna had finally sketched out a design that had Ali's approval.

"I love it." The socialite beamed.

"Of course you do, I'm amazing." Hanna replied like it was obvious, putting her things away, "I'll have it made and then we'll do a fitting to get it just right."

"Can we leave now?" Emily asked with a dramatic sigh.

"Well I definitely have to, my flight is going to leave without me if not." Spencer said getting up, "We'll have to do this again soon."

"Definitely," Aria agreed also getting up, "My flight is going to leave without me too, I'll see you all soon I hope."

"Is everyone still heading home for Thanksgiving?" Hanna asked.

"Hell yes," Spencer nodded, "Although I have a lot of work to do over the holiday so we might have to cut down the day drinking."

Hanna just scoffed.

"Well I'll see you in a week then." Aria said excitedly. "I am totally up for the day drinking."

"Hurray!" Hanna clapped.

Emily hugged her friends goodbye and then watched as they both went to hug a not entirely comfortable looking Alison.

"Let me know if you need any help with your book." Aria said to her as she pulled out of the embrace.

"Yeah, thanks again." Ali smiled a little shyly.

"Yeah, give me a call if you need anything." Spencer said handing Alison one of her cards.

"Will do." Ali said, taking it and putting it into her pocket.

Once they had said goodbye to Hanna they began the walk home.

"Your friends are really nice." Ali said after a few moments of silence.

"They are." Emily agreed.

"They really don't care about me do they?"

Emily stopped in her tracks, she had no idea what had given the blonde this impression.

"Ali they really like you." She said with confusion.

"No, I don't mean like that," Ali quickly clarified, "I mean they don't care who I am, the fame thing."

"Oh," Emily felt relief as she started walking again, "no, they really don't give a shit. I mean Hanna is your number one fan, but she still won't treat you any differently than anyone else."

"Yeah I noticed that." Ali replied tight lipped, and Emily knows she's referring to what happened in the café.

"Ali I'm sorry about that, she's just…" Emily really didn't know how to explain.

"It's okay," Ali said reassuringly.

Emily just looked at her with a raised eyebrow, she wasn't buying it.

"Seriously." Ali emphasised the word, "She's just Hanna, she's brazenly honest and I really admire that about her. I don't want her to treat me any differently. Brunch was honestly great, for the first time in my life I felt normal. Like a real person. I mean other than with you."

"You are a real person Ali." Emily gently reminded her.

"I know, but sometimes the world seems to forget that." Ali sighed sadly.

As if to prove her point a couple of photographers arrived and started taking her picture. This drew attention from passers by and they were surrounded in seconds.

"I don't know what made me think that we could walk this." She shook her head.

"I'll get us a cab." Emily said, flagging down the nearest one.

Once they were in the cab and on their way Emily turned to Alison.

"They're your friends too you know, if you want them to be."

Ali was silent for a few minutes, "I think I do."

"Are you going to write the book?" Emily asked as they walked through the door.

"I didn't have any plans to." Ali said, walking through into the living room. "We'll see."

Emily just nodded, not wanting to push her into it. Honestly though she thought it was a great idea. Plus if Spencer believed she could do it enough to raise the subject, then she was sure this book was going to be brilliant.

"What time are you meeting with your mom?" Ali asked, sitting down on the couch and kicking her heels off.

"In about half an hour. I'm going to take her around, show her the sights, then out for dinner."

"That sounds lovely." Alison looked up at her, a genuine smile on her face.

"You sure you won't come to dinner?" Emily tried again.

"I'm sure," Alison wasn't going to be moved on the issue. "I've booked you the best table at La Grenouille, order whatever you want, they'll just charge it to me after."

"You don't have to do that." Emily wasn't comfortable taking Alison's money, especially if she wasn't even there.

"Well if I were you I would accept my kind offer because I know for a fact I don't pay you enough to eat there on your own dime." Alison's tone was light and joking, but Emily couldn't help but feel bad.

"Seriously, we can just go to a normal restaurant." Emily said looking down.

"Em I was kidding." Ali stood up and walked toward her.

"Yeah I know, it's just…I don't want people thinking I'm some kind of gold digger. I'm not in this for you to be my meal ticket Ali. I'm not a freeloader." Emily rubbed the back of her neck.

Ali's lips met hers softly and then pulled away, "I know, which is exactly why I'm willing to do this. If I thought for a second you were doing this for my money, well you wouldn't be here."

"Okay," Emily nodded, "Just as long as you know that."

"I've never doubted it once, " Ali answered with honesty, "now please let me do this one nice thing for you and your mother."

"Alright," Emily agreed, "I'd feel better about it if you came though."

"Not happening." Ali gave her a stern look, "you are stubborn you know."

Emily couldn't help but laugh, "Hey you should be careful throwing those stones around this glass house."

"Oh shut up," Ali stuck her tongue out. "Go on, you don't want to be late."

Emily stuck her tongue out in response, before giving her a goodbye kiss and heading out of the door.

She'd had a lovely afternoon with her mom. She'd met her straight off the train and they had embraced warmly. Seeing Alison's relationship with her parents made her appreciate hers all the more. They walked around the city, did the usual touristy stuff and never ran out of things to talk about. She really was lucky to have Pam Fields as her mother.

"Wow this looks fancy Emily." Pam looked at the entrance to the restaurant with wide eyes.

"Yes, it really does." Emily wasn't massively comfortable with the whole fine dining thing. She'd gotten a lot more used to it over the last few months, having spent enough time inside places like this as Alison ate with people she didn't even like.

"Am I dressed okay?" Pam asked, turning to Emily and giving a little twirl.

"You look great mom," Emily smiled.

"Don't take this the wrong way Emily, but how exactly can you afford this?" Pam queried.

"I can't." Emily said matter of factly, "But my boss just happens to be super rich and super generous."

"Well thank you Miss DiLaurentis" Pam nodded in approval as they entered.

Emily was about to give their names to the maitre d when another waiter appeared out of nowhere.

"Right this way." He said in a heavy French accent.

Emily and her mother just exchanged a look and followed without question. He led them through the restaurant and through another set of doors in the back which led to a small private dining area. Emily's eyes widened with shock, then she was grinning from ear to ear.

"Thank you Michel." Alison nodded politely at the waiter, who took that as his cue to leave.

She stood up from her seat at the table and extended a hand to Pam.

"Mrs Fields, it's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Alison." She said, shaking her hand.

"It's lovely to meet you too Alison, please, call me Pam."

"Please take a seat, they have a fantastic menu here, I hope you brought your appetite." Ali continued like this was all the most normal thing in the world.

"Thank you so much for treating us to this meal, Emily didn't say you'd be joining us, but I have to say I'm thrilled to meet you." Pam smiled warmly at Alison.

Emily just continued to stand, watching the interaction with shock. She was pretty sure that the hundred times she must have asked Ali to come tonight, the answer had always been a resounding no.

"Are you not joining us Emmy?" Pam said turning round to see what her daughter was doing.

Alison took the opportunity to mouth 'Emmy?' While Pam's back was turned, an amused look on her face.

"Yeah of course." Emily moved to sit down, waiting until her mother wasn't looking at her anymore to throw Ali a look that said, 'I dare you to try and call me that'.

"I'm sorry where's the bathroom?" Pam asked Alison, moving to get up again, I'd like to wash my hands.

Alison picked up a bell that Emily hadn't realised was on the table and rang it. Within seconds Michel was back in the room.

"Show Mrs Fields to the bathroom please." Alison told the waiter.

"Fancy." Pam said pulling an impressed face before following Michel.

As soon as they'd left Emily didn't waste any time, "Not that I'm complaining but what are you doing here?"

"When you want me to do something but you don't really care you ask once. When you want me to do something and it's moderately important to you, you ask twice. You asked me about ten times to come tonight."

"So what changed between this morning and now?" Emily asked with a quirked eyebrow.

"I spoke to Hanna."

"Any particular reason?"

"I got bored, and she's good company." Alison shrugged.

"So you thought, I'll just call Hanna?" Emily asked amused.

"No, I text her."

"Ah right."

"Then she came round."

"What?" Emily was glad she hadn't taken a drink because she's pretty sure she would have done a spit take.

"Do you not want me to be friends with her?" Alison asked, sounding a little hurt.

"Of course I want you to be friends," Emily quickly set her straight, "I was just a little shocked you invited her round that's all."

"I didn't." Alison said with a laugh, "she just turned up about three messages in. Sat herself on my couch hungover and made me watch Netflix with her."

"I am so sorry Ali." Emily put her head in her hands.

"Don't be, it was actually fun." Alison assured, "Anyway we got to talking and, well I'm here aren't I?"

"God bless Hanna Marin." Emily chuckled.

"How do I make your mom like me?" Alison asked, suddenly very serious.

"What?"

"I want your mom to like me, how do I do it?"

"Well you're doing a swell job so far. Just be yourself." Emily reassured her.

"That's your advice? Be yourself? Where's the inside knowledge?" Ali threw her hands up.

"That is the inside knowledge." Emily answered calmly, "My mom can smell bullshit from a mile away, so just be yourself and she'll either like you or she won't."

"Oh fantastic." Ali rolled her eyes.

"You want my mothers approval." Emily stated with a smug grin.

"Of course I want your mothers approval, you're my girlfriend. Not that she knows that, but if it ever does come to light I want her to actually like me. I assumed that's why you wanted me to meet her?"

"Well you're both important to me, I just wanted you to meet. It doesn't make a difference to me whether she approves of you or not." Emily shrugged.

"Well it makes a difference to me." Alison hissed.

"Am I ever going to get your parents approval?" Emily asked with raised eyebrows.

"Of course not." Alison scoffed, "You could cure cancer and they wouldn't approve of you. That's different though."

"How so?"

"Well unlike my parents, your mother wasn't forged out of the fires of hell by Lucifer himself."

"You've got me there." Emily nodded thoughtfully.

Just then Pam reappeared through the doors.

"Emmy you have to go to the bathroom, I can't even, just wow." Pam gushed as she sat down. "Is everything alright?" She asked looking between the two of them.

"Everything is great." Emily answered with a smile.

The meal was lovely. Alison and Pam got on better than Emily could have hoped for, they shared similar interests in books and spoke at great length about novels that Emily had never even heard of. Pam asked questions about Alison's life and upbringing, not to be nosey, but out of general interest and Emily was happy to see that Ali never got defensive. She shared funny stories about Emily as a child, Alison relishing every detail and clearly enjoying watching Emily squirm with embarrassment. Ali didn't seem guarded with her mother, she had clearly taken onboard Emily's advice about her bullshit reader.

"So what are your plans for thanksgiving Alison?" Pam asked as they ate their dessert.

"Nothing special." Alison answered noncommittally.

"Are not spending it with your family?" Pam looked shocked.

"My parents usually go to Hawaii for the weekend, it's the only time my dad really takes off." Ali forces a smile.

Emily felt terrible, she hadn't even thought about what Ali would be doing for thanksgiving. She had just assumed that there would be a family thing for her to attend.

"Well you are more than welcome to come to Rosewood. There will be a place for you at our table if you want it." Pam smiled warmly.

Emily looked at her mother a little shocked, but she felt her heart swell with pride. Her mother really was the nicest person. She also liked the idea of taking Alison to Rosewood and showing her where she grew up. She knew it would be a hard sell though, maybe she'd have to get Hanna to convince her she thought with an internal laugh.

"That's very kind of you, but really I'll be fine, thank you." Alison replied.

They finished their meal and Alison sorted out the bill, refusing Pam's offer to pay for hers and Emily's. Something Emily was glad of because she was pretty certain that if Pam saw the cost of the evening she'd probably pass out right there.

"Carter will take you to your hotel." Alison said as they left the restaurant.

"Oh I'm not staying in the city tonight, I have to get back." Pam answered.

As much as Emily would have loved for her mother to stay a few days, she had to get back to work so it was a flying visit. A long train ride in the morning and evening.

"How are you getting home?" Alison asked.

"I'm booked on a train."

"That'll take you hours!" Alison sounded appalled.

"Worth it to see my Emmy." Pam squeezed her daughter affectionately.

"Get in the car." Alison ordered firmly.

"Excuse me?"

"Trust me, it's best not to argue." Emily said to her mother and greeted Carter as they entered the vehicle.

Alison was on the phone when she got in.

"To Rosewood, Pennsylvania. Yes. We're on route now, have it ready." Alison hung up the phone, "The hanger please Carter."

Carter nodded and pulled away from the curb.

"Errm Ali, you want to fill us in here?" Emily questioned her girlfriend.

"Your mother is not spending hours on a train at this time of night."

"You said hanger?" Emily asked.

"Yes, the pilot is ready and waiting. You'll be back in Rosewood in an hour Pam." Alison's tone left no room for argument.

Pam didn't even try to argue as Alison put her on the plane. She just thanked her profusely and gave them both hugs before she boarded.

"There will be a car waiting for you at the other side to take you home." Alison said pulling away from the embrace.

"How the other half live." Pam joked as she waved goodbye.

"You chartered a private jet for my mother." Emily stated, a little shell shocked.

"So?" Alison replied as they walked back to the car.

"You really wanted that approval eh?" She laughed.

"You have no idea." Alison laughed with her as they got back into the car.

Alison had woken Emily up by peppering kisses all over her face. It had soon escalated and they were now in the middle of some fantastic morning sex. Emily could definitely get used to this. Her fingers were buried deep inside her girlfriend as she kissed her passionately.

"Faster." Ali moaned into her mouth.

Emily obliged with pleasure.

"Oh God..Em…oh God…yes."

If there was one thing Emily loved about sex with Alison, it was how vocal she was. It was a definite ego booster.

"Let go baby." Emily breathed into her ear as Alison came apart around her fingers.

"You are really good at that." Alison panted as she came down from her high.

"You're not too bad yourself." Emily replied, wrapping herself around her girlfriend.

"I need a drink." Ali moved to get out of bed.

"Don't leave me." Emily pouted.

"I'll be two minutes." Ali said getting up and putting her robe on, "Get some rest before I come back." She winked.

Emily groaned, that girl would be the death of her, but what a way to go she thought with a smile.

Alison hummed to herself as she got a bottle of water out of the fridge. She didn't have any engagements for the day and she had no other plans than to spend the day in bed with Emily. She was broken out of her thoughts by the door shutting.

"Oh good, you finally made it out of bed." Martha said as she entered the kitchen.

"Martha, hey, good morning." Alison stuttered, praying that Emily didn't wonder where she was and come down.

"Only just still morning." Martha chastised with a smile.

"What are you doing here?" Alison questioned.

"Well I was planning on cleaning, but when I first arrived this morning it didn't seem like a good time, so I've come back."

"You've already been here?" Alison gulped.

"Yes. Now is Emily going to get out of bed today or am I just doing the downstairs?" Martha asked with a glint in her eye.

"What do you mean?" Alison tried to play dumb.

"Emily? Your girlfriend? Tall? Brunette? You were kissing her in the hall the other day?" Martha replied in a playful tone.

"Martha I don't know what you're talking about." Alison was getting flustered now.

"Well then I can only presume you've suffered a stroke this morning then."

Alison just stood, trying to think of something to say, anything.

"Look Alison, I'm old, but I'm not senile yet. Either that woman upstairs is your girlfriend or you've suddenly got deeply religious and you were praying very loudly with her this morning."

"Oh my God." Alison went bright red and put her head in her hands.

"Yes, it was something like that." Martha laughed.

"Martha I…" Alison was lost for words.

"It's nice to finally see you happy dear, she seems like a good egg." She walked over and put an arm around her shoulders.

"Please don't…" Again Ali couldn't finish a sentence, she felt like crying.

"Oh don't worry about me, I'm not going to say anything." She said hugging Alison, "I'm just so glad you've found someone to take care of you. Someone who loves you like you deserve to be loved."

"She doesn't…I mean we've only…"

"Whatever you say dear." Martha said as she started getting her cleaning stuff out, "I'm sure it was your winning smile that caused her to decorate an entire room single handedly on her day off. Right, I'll start with that room I think. Oh and Alison, you might want to cover that." She pointed to her neck and then she wondered off to the living room.

This was fast becoming the worst kept secret she'd ever had.

Emily was still snuggled up under the sheets when she got back upstairs.

"Hey, what took you so long?" She whined.

"Martha is here."

"Shit." Emily exclaimed jumping out of bed and grabbing clothes as she went.

"Relax, she knows." Alison said running her hands through her hair.

"Relax?" Emily stopped with one leg in her jeans.

"She won't say anything, she was actually really cool about it. Embarrassing, but cool." She sat down on the edge of the bed.

"Oh," Emily removed her leg from the jeans, "Well that's good right?"

"Yeah." Alison said without any expression.

"So do you want to tell your face that?" Emily joked.

"Sorry, it's just…this is starting to become a very badly kept secret." She put her head back in her hands.

"Six people know Ali. Six. In the grand scheme of the world that's nobody."

"I guess."

"Every single one of them can be trusted."

"Paige can be trusted?" Alison scoffed.

"She's a lot of things Ali, but she's not a bad person. She would never out somebody, that's not who she is."

"Okay." Alison sighed and then smiled, "You're right. It's all fine."

"It is." Emily said walking over to her and crouching in front of her.

"What?" Alison asked.

"What do you mean what?"

"You have that look on your face when you want to ask me something."

"Ah, you're getting good at this." Emily smirked.

"So? What is it?" Alison pressed.

"Come to Rosewood for thanksgiving." Emily said.

"No."

"Why?"

"Because."

"That isn't a reason." Emily frowned.

"I don't want to be a burden."

"You're not a burden, you're my girlfriend. I want to show you where I grew up. It's a small place, there'll be no paps, no press. Just friends and family."

"I'll be fine here." Alison protested.

"I don't doubt it, but I want you to come."

"No." Alison dug her heels in.

"Fine." Emily said standing up.

"Fine?" Alison questioned, that had been far too easy.

"Yes, fine. If you won't come to Rosewood then I'll stay here with you."

Alison knew it had been too simple.

"You can't do that." Alison snapped.

"Yeah? Watch me." Emily crossed her arms and stared her down.

They stayed like that for a while, just staring each other out.

"Fine." Alison sighed.

"Fine?" Emily cocked her head, "Right, I'll ring my mom and tell her I won't be able to make it."

"No, I mean fine I'll come." She said, rolling her eyes.

"Well that was easier than I thought it would be. I thought I was going to have to ask ten times and then get Hanna involved."

Alison just stuck her tongue out, before Emily rushed toward her and tackled her onto the bed. She couldn't even pretend to be mad as the brunette kissed her all over. She let out a giggle.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you." Emily said between kisses.

"You owe me."

"Oh I think I can think of something." Emily whispered seductively and started to move her hands.

"Martha is still downstairs." Alison reminded her.

"Ah yeah, shit." Emily jumped up, "Right I'm off to shower." She kissed Ali and practically skipped out of the room.

Alison laughed as she watched her go. She started to think about what Martha had said, did Emily love her? She had seen a look in her eyes weeks ago that had scared her enough to think she might. She shook the thought out of her head, she wasn't ready to think about that yet. Then another question popped into her head, did she love Emily? She shook her head again, definitely not ready to think about that. She forced herself up and went to get ready.

 **Well there we are. Thoughts? opinions? Fun stories about your pets? I accept it all. Have a great day! I'm at work in four and a half hours and I still need to sleep so I will also accept your sympathy :-p**


	11. Chapter 11

**I'm alive, I apologise for the wait. Life and all that goes with it as usual. Thank you for all your lovely reviews. Disappointing there weren't any pet stories. You guys need to work on that, give and take people, come on :-p**

 **So I know that thanksgiving was 4 years ago now, but this chapter has it anyway. I hope to have my Christmas chapter up by Easter...**

 **This ones for Bruce.**

It was Tuesday and Alison was in the office again with her father. As he would be away for the weekend, their usual Saturday appointment was being pulled forward. God forbid she just have a week off, she thought, rolling her eyes as she pulled up yet more figures from the past year.

"Best year so far." Her father said looking over her shoulder, "So good I'm going to up your allowance for next year."

While Alison made some money from her exploits of being Alison DiLaurentis, her primary source of income, and the reason she could afford the lifestyle she had, came from her allowance. She couldn't even remember a time in her life where she had looked at the price of something. She'd never had to, thanks to daddy's money. It wasn't something that she'd ever in thought about before, but spending time with Emily made her realise that her entire lifestyle was somewhat ridiculous. Knowing that and being willing to give it up were two completely different things though.

"Thank you." She smiled at her father and carried on trying to get everything done so that she could hopefully get out of there at a reasonable time. They were flying to Rosewood in the morning, Hanna and Caleb joining them for the trip. However it was 9pm already and she was nowhere near done.

"I don't mind if you want to come back in tomorrow instead to finish this up." Her father said, getting his coat to leave.

Knowing that wasn't an option Alison just smiled through gritted teeth, "Nope, I'd rather just get it done tonight."

"I'm proud of you," Kenneth said as he headed to the door, "It's that kind of work ethic that has made this family so successful."

Alison just smiled back. While she didn't doubt that her father had worked hard for his money, something that was evident by the fact that he was missing from most of her childhood memories, she was pretty sure his success was also down to being ruthless and lacking any morals.

It was 3am by the time Alison finally got home. She made her way upstairs and got ready for bed. Settling down beneath the covers she found herself unable to sleep. Something was missing. Pepe had gone to Martha's so that there was someone to take care of him while they were away, but that wasn't it. She reached her arm over to the empty side of the bed. Emily had decided to stay at home as she needed to pack and Ali wouldn't be there anyway. Feeling angry at herself for feeling so needy she shut her eyes and rolled over, trying to force sleep to come. Less than two minutes later she gave in. Rolling back over she grabbed the pillow from what had become Emily's side and cuddled it, breathing in the familiar scent. It wasn't as good as the brunette herself, but it was comforting to feel her near. Finally sleep came.

"I cannot believe we get to fly in a private jet!" Hanna squealed as they got themselves settled onboard.

"Really? Because with the amount of times you've mentioned it I thought it would have sunk in by now." Caleb teased her, rolling his eyes at Emily.

Alison just smiled tiredly. She'd hardly had any sleep and she was certainly feeling it.

"You ok babe?" Emily asked quietly.

"Yeah, just a little tired." Alison reassured her.

"Well hurry up and perk yourself up, because we have a fun couple of days ahead of us." Hanna said with a wink.

It was the first time that Alison had met Caleb. She'd been a little apprehensive with him working for her father, but Emily had soon soothed her nerves. To be fair he seemed like a good guy, surely Hanna wouldn't have given him the time of day if not. Plus without him she never would have even known that Emily existed.

They landed at the private airstrip around 10am. She hadn't even bothered to try and sleep on the plane. Partly because of the short flight and partly because she never felt comfortable falling asleep around other people. Emily excluded of course.

"There's a car Caleb!" Hanna squealed again as they stepped off the plane, "Do you see babe? A car!"

"Wow, a real car." Caleb mimicked Hanna's enthusiasm with a large dose of sarcasm.

"Why is nobody else excited?" Hanna muttered annoyed.

"Sorry Han," Emily soothed, "we didn't realise you'd never been in a car before."

Hanna just threw her a glare and stalked off toward the waiting vehicle as the others laughed.

They dropped Hanna and Caleb off at her mom's house before heading to Pam's. Ali was excited to see the house that Emily had grown up in. She was excited to see the town that had helped shape Emily into the person that she was.

"Mom we're here!" Emily shouted as they entered the home.

Alison followed in behind taking in her surroundings and the homely smell. It wasn't like any house she had been in before, this felt like a real home.

"You're here!" Pam came running out of the kitchen and enveloped Emily into a big hug.

"That's what I just said mom." Emily laughed as she hugged her back.

"Oh and Alison, I'm so glad you could come!" Pam said, releasing Emily and giving the same enthusiastic hug to the blonde. Alison just stood awkwardly before hugging her back while Emily watched on with a smile.

"Are you hungry? Do you want a drink?" Pam asked walking back toward the kitchen, motioning the girls to follow.

"Actually can we just get settled first mom?" Emily called after her.

"Oh of course, just take your things upstairs." Pam shouted from the kitchen.

Alison followed Emily up the stairs and into what she presumed was her childhood room. She walked around while Emily dumped their bags. There were trophies and medals all over the room, closer inspection revealed that they were all for various swimming competitions. Carrying on her inspection she found countless photographs of Emily and her friends, they all looked so young and happy. Alison found herself feeling a little jealous of Emily's clearly happy carefree youth.

"The guest room is made up if you want to sleep in there?" Emily said breaking her from her thoughts, "It's up to you."

"Yeah, I think that's for the best." Alison nodded. As much as she hated Emily not sleeping next to her, she really didn't want Pam knowing the extent of her relationship with her daughter.

"Okay," Emily smiled a little sadly, "Right this way."

Emily picked up Ali's things and led her down the hall to guest room.

"Bathroom is the door we passed on the left next to my room, my mom's is the one at the end." Emily explained as they entered the room.

"Thank you." Alison said as Emily put her stuff down.

"Do you want a drink or something?" Emily asked.

"Actually I was going to have a little lie down if that's okay. I don't want your mom to think I'm rude though." Alison wanted to make a good impression on Pam.

"She won't think that's rude, she'll understand." Emily reassured her. "In that case I think I'm going to go for a run around my old route."

Alison just pulled a face, she would never understand Emily's love of running from one place to another.

"Get some rest, I'll let my mom know." Emily said leaning forward to kiss her goodbye before shutting the door behind her leaving Alison alone.

Alison put her stuff away and flopped down onto the soft mattress. It didn't take long before sleep overcame her.

"Alison."

Ali heard a soft voice say disturbing her from her much needed slumber.

"Alison."

The voice came again, she didn't want to wake up yet, she was far too comfortable.

"Just five more minutes babe." Ali mumbled sleepily.

"Okay, but I just worried that you might not be able to sleep tonight, you've been out for a couple of hours." Pam's voice jolted Alison wide awake.

"Pam, sorry I thought you were…" Alison stopped herself short of admitting the truth, "somebody else." She quickly recovered.

Pam just smiled, "I figured, well there's lunch downstairs if you want it."

"That would be lovely." Alison answered, relieved that Pam seemed to have let her sleepy indiscretion go.

"Just come down when you're ready," Pam said over her shoulder as she left, "There's no rush Emily hasn't come back from her run yet."

Alison and Pam were eating when a very sweaty Emily finally came through the door.

"Im sorry I was so long, I got a little carried away." She explained as she approached the table.

"It's fine dear, I've saved you some lunch."

"Thanks." Emily said heading to sit down.

"You can have it after you've showered." Pam said in a tone that left no room for argument.

Emily just laughed and headed upstairs.

After they had finished lunch and caught up with Pam they headed into the living room.

"I'm just going to nip out, I have a few errands to run." Pam shouted through to them.

As soon as she heard the door shut Alison turned to Emily, "We might have a problem."

"Problem?" Emily asked with a quirked eyebrow.

"I called your mom babe." Ali said without the slightest trace of humour.

Emily stared at her with a serious look on her face, "Well, I mean…I won't get between you two, if that's what you really want."

"Emily I'm being serious!" Ali wasn't in the mood for joking.

"Woah what's happening in here?" Hanna's voice entered the room just before she did.

"Oh hey Han, please just let yourself in." Emily's sarcasm evident in her tone.

"Yeah I did thanks," Hanna replied, sitting down and making herself at home, "So what's going on?"

"Ali called my mom babe." Emily laughed.

"It's not funny!" Alison was getting irritated by Emily's apparent apathy toward the situation.

"Context?" Hanna questioned.

Ali sighed, "She woke me up, I thought it was Emily."

"It could have been worse." Hanna scoffed.

"How?" Alison stood and put her hands on her hips.

"You could have called her, angelic unicorn of my bloodstream." Hanna suggested with a shrug.

"Okay Han I don't even…who would…that's not thing." Emily rolled her eyes at her best friend.

"What if she knows?" Ali stared right into Emily's eyes.

"Bitch please, of course she knows." Hanna interrupted again, causing Alison to whip her head round.

"Hanna!" Emily scolded, placing a hand on Ali's arm, causing her to soften somewhat.

"So you don't think she knows?" Ali asked softly.

"Oh no, Hanna's right, she definitely knows. I just don't like her calling you bitch." Emily smiled.

Alison sat back down on the couch with a groan, "What has she said?"

"Nothing, but I'm pretty sure she knows. I mean who brings their boss home for thanksgiving?"

Alison let out another groan, Emily was right, "There's no chance that your mother is an idiot then?"

"Not the last time I checked." Emily said sitting next to her.

"Well now that's sorted, come on we're meetings Spence and Aria at the brew." Hanna clapped standing up.

"Is that a good idea?" Alison questioned, "I mean I don't want to stop you from doing things but what if someone recognises me?"

"It'll be fine." Emily replied like it was no big deal.

"No, it won't be. Just go without me. Seriously I'll be fine here." As much as she wanted to see the town and spend time with Emily and her friends, the idea of being spotted wasn't appealing.

"How open are you to change?" Hanna questioned with a head tilt.

Alison just looked at her with questioning eyes.

"Em we'll meet you there. Tell the others we won't be too long." Hanna grabbed Alison's hand and pulled her up.

"Hanna where are you taking my girlfriend?" Emily called after them as Hanna dragged her outside.

"See you soon!" She called back as she bundled Ali into the passenger seat.

Once Hanna had got in the car and started driving Ali got over her initial shock and found her voice.

"Hanna where are you taking me?" She turned in her seat to look at the grinning blonde.

"My house." Was all she got in reply.

"Hanna I'm not sure that this is a good idea." Ali voiced her concern as they finally pulled up outside the coffee shop.

"Well be sure, because this is an excellent idea."

Alison couldn't help but find her enthusiasm a little infectious.

"Alright," She said taking a deep breath.

"Now remember the plan, go in and just find a random seat." Hanna was getting giddier by the second.

Taking another deep breath she exited the car and headed toward the door, catching a glimpse of her reflection in the window. She barely recognised herself. The dark wig that Hanna had put her in looked foreign sitting on her head. Even her face wasn't completely hers, Hanna seemed to have transformed her into a total stranger. Now came the real test though. She entered the brew and looked straight ahead, walking to the far corner and taking a seat. Daring to steal a glance at the table where a concerned looking Emily and her friends sat, they hadn't even looked up at her. Hanna was right.

The blonde walked in triumphantly, a knowing smirk on her face.

"Hanna!" Emily stood and rounded on her, "Where the hell is she?!"

Hanna just laughed and motioned for Ali to come over.

"Hi." Ali spoke as she approached the table.

"What the…" Emily didn't finish her sentence, instead she studied Alison intently from head to toe.

"Meet Vivian." Hanna practically squealed.

"Well credit where credits due Han, I didn't see that one coming." Spencer tipped her head to Hanna.

They began talking amongst themselves, but Alison wasn't listening. Instead she was studying Emily's face, trying to figure out what her girlfriend made of her new look.

"It's different." Was all Emily offered.

"Do you not like it?" Alison pulled at her wig.

"I would like you no matter how you looked, it's just…different." She pulled a face.

"Well nobody seems to recognise you so sit down and let's order." Aria patted the seat next her.

They had been there for around an hour, just chatting and sharing stories. For the first time in her life Alison felt like she had actual friends. It was a nice feeling, strange but nice. She still didn't trust them completely yet, part of her would always have her guard up. She didn't trust anyone completely though, not Emily, not even herself.

A group of teenagers entered, they were talking loudly and obnoxiously. Seemingly oblivious to the disturbance they were causing the other patrons.

"Were we ever that annoying?" Hanna asked, throwing the group a dirty look.

"We weren't no," Spencer answered, "but you definitely were."

This got a laugh from the rest of the group, while Hanna pretended to sulk. Then Alison heard something that pricked her interest from the corner the teenagers had taken over.

"Alison DiLaurentis."

Apparently the others had heard it too, they all stopped talking and listened intently to what was being said.

"Seriously?" One of the girls in the group didn't look impressed with what the boy had just said.

"If I get to pick one person, then I'd cheat on you with Alison DiLaurentis."

Ali couldn't help but giggle at the jealous look that had just crossed Emily's face, something that Aria had picked up on as well.

"Em he's about 16, I don't think he's a threat." She laughed.

Emily rubbed the back of her neck and blushed.

Hanna leaned over to Alison with a serious look on her face, "Do you want me to get you his number?"

"Alright, alright." Emily finally laughed too.

The teens weren't finished discussing her just yet though.

"Why?" The annoyed girlfriend asked.

"Are you kidding? I mean look at her."

The boys friends whistled and clapped approvingly. Ali flipped her hair and winked at her new friends, who started to giggle again.

"Plus you just know she's going to be good in bed."

Emily nodded involuntarily before quickly catching herself and blushing again. The girls were trying to stifle their laughs now, not wanting to be caught listening in.

"Yeah," Another boy spoke up, "I'll bet you she's dirty as anything. Rumour has it she screws fans all the time."

Alison's face dropped and her eyes widened. This was not a rumour she had heard before.

"They're just kids Ali," Spencer whispered, "They talk shit."

"Someone I know said that she practically begged his cousin for it at a party."

She wanted so badly to get up and get them told, but that would mean blowing her cover. Emily however was already rising out of her seat.

"Sit down, and grow up. They're teenagers." Spencer scolded, pushing her back down.

"I heard that Rollins wasn't even a conman at all. Apparently it she was actually paying him for some kind of fifty shades of grey shit. She was just too embarrassed to admit it." One of the girls had joined in.

At the sound of Rollins name Alison sunk into her chair.

"Well she's a total bitch anyway, everybody knows it."

"Yeah, but I'd kill to look like her. I'll bet she's an idiot with no personality though." Another girl joined in, causing the group to burst into laughter.

Is this how people spoke about her when she wasn't there?

"They might be teenagers but they're assholes." Hanna rose out of her seat angrily.

"Fuck it." Spencer got up too, and followed Hanna's angry march over to the corner.

Emily went to get up, but Aria pushed her down, "I really doubt they need back up."

"Are you okay?" Emily asked softly, eyes searching Alison's.

"Of course." Ali replied trying to put on her best smile, "Nothing I haven't heard before."

Emily didn't look convinced.

She looked over to the corner where the teenagers were quickly getting up and heading to the door.

"Learn some respect!" Hanna shouted after them.

"You really didn't have to do that." Ali said as they came and sat back down, she was embarrassed.

"You stand up for your friends." Hanna still looked angry.

"Yes," Spencer agreed, "Which in this case apparently means threatening to do horrible things to minors." She threw Hanna a pointed look.

"I stand by everything I said." She crossed her arms defiantly.

"Well thank you." Alison looked at Emily who was currently looking at her friends with affection.

"So I'm thinking…" Hanna started.

"Night out?" Aria finished.

"Night out." Hanna nodded enthusiastically.

"I have so much work I've got to do guys." Spencer groaned.

"It's thanksgiving Spence! This is tradition!" Hanna practically begged, "Em and Ali are coming."

"We are?" Ali questioned, looking at Emily.

"Could be kinda fun." Emily shrugged.

"Of course you are," Hanna scoffed, "You think I did that makeover for a coffee?"

Spencer finally agreed to come as long as it wasn't anything too wild. After her and Hanna argued for ten minutes they compromised on a bar not too far outside town.

"What does everyone want to drink?" Spencer asked as she headed to the bar.

"Just a water for me please." Emily answered first.

"What?!" Hanna exclaimed.

Alison knew exactly why Emily was asking for water, she still felt like she was working.

"Em, have a drink. It's ok, you're not responsible for me right now."

"I'm always responsible for you." Emily answered straight back.

"Well in that case, you're fired. I'll hire you again tomorrow, but for tonight at least, can't you just have a normal night out with your friends?" Ali smiled at Emily warmly, she loved how much she cared, but right now she just wanted to experience what normal people did on a night out.

Emily stared at her for while, seeming to understand, "Okay, I'll have a beer."

"The nights on me," Ali said pulling a wad of cash out of her purse and handing it to Spencer, "Go crazy."

"You really don't have to do that Alison." Aria said.

"Yeah but don't feel that you can't."

"Hanna!" Aria chastised.

"What, I'm just saying, if she wants to be nice who am I to stop her?"

Alison just laughed, "Please, it's my treat."

Several rounds later and the party was in full swing. The girls were all quite drunk, it took a lot of coaxing from Alison but Emily was finally letting her hair down. They were dancing, Hanna and Emily currently partaking in yet another mock dance off. While Hanna was what Ali would call an enthusiastic dancer, Emily was downright sexy. Alison couldn't take her eyes off her girlfriend.

With Emily declared the winner yet again, much to Hanna's dismay, a bathroom trip was agreed upon.

The bar had gotten pretty busy in the time they'd been there, lots of people home for the holidays. Ali wasn't used to waiting in line for anything. She couldn't remember a time in her life that she'd had to queue up like a regular person. If she wanted something, she got it. She'd certainly never had to wait in line just to go to the bathroom. However not a single person had even looked twice at her all day, there was something wonderfully freeing about being Vivian Darkbloom.

"Oh take that look off your face, we've been stood here two minutes." Hanna said rolling her eyes.

"Two minutes too long." Ali complained.

"Not so fun being a regular person eh?" Emily teased.

Feeling bold with her new sense of anonymity Ali moved to stand in front of her smug looking girlfriend and kissed her.

"I don't know, it has it's perks." She winked at a stunned looking Emily as she pulled away. She turned back round to see Hanna stood with the biggest, stupidest grin on her face.

"Oh take that look off your face." She mimicked Hanna's earlier words, trying to hide her blush as she entered the newly free cubicle.

"Do you want another drink?" Spencer pulled her attention as she left the bathroom.

"Sure, I'll get them though." Ali nodded, heading up to the bar. It was little things like this, something as simple as going to the bar, that she'd never got to experience before. It was stupid but she was actually enjoying herself. She could only imagine what her parents would say.

"Hey, how are you doing tonight?" A voice broke her out of her thoughts.

"Hi." She said politely before carrying on her way to the bar and away from the clearly drunk man.

"My names Tom, can I get you a drink?" He was following behind her.

"I'm good thanks." She shouted over her shoulder, never breaking her stride. Finally she made it to the bar.

"Well if you're not thirsty how about we just get out of here?" He winked at her.

Alison was gobsmacked, where the hell did this guy get off thinking he could just pick her up in bar? She was Alison DiLaurentis for gods sake! Then it dawned on her, he didn't know that.

"I never got your name." He leaned in closer.

"I never gave it." She replied curtly, leaning away.

"Hey, have we met before?" He leaned even further, studying her face with his glazed eyes.

Panic set in, the guy wasn't so drunk that he didn't recognise her face.

"Definitely not." She snapped, "My name is Vivian."

"Are you sure? You look really familiar." He moved closer again.

"Positive, now can you leave me alone please." Her eyes darted around trying to find Emily, the place was packed now though and she couldn't see anyone she knew.

"Aw, don't be like that Vivian." He put his arm around her, "Maybe you and me can get a little more familiar then."

Alison froze, she'd never had to deal with a situation like this before. Sure she got it from a distance all the time, she'd even had the incident with Lorenzo, but she'd never had to do anything other than walk away while someone else dealt with the problem.

"I can give you the best sex of your life." He whispered right into her face, she could smell the alcohol on his breath.

She'd had enough, she was Alison DiLaurentis whether he knew it or not, and she certainly didn't put up with shit like this.

"I'm already having it thank you very much." She spoke boldly as she forcefully removed his arm, "Now please kindly fuck off."

"Come on now, don't be like that." He said, reaching his arm back out to grab her.

"She told you to fuck off!" Emily's voice made Alison jump.

"We were just..." The guy started to speak.

"No, you were just harassing my girlfriend." She put her arms around Alison protectively.

"Well I didn't see that coming." The guy laughed.

"Are you okay?" Emily turned Ali in her arms to face her, kissing her forehead.

"Yeah I'm fine." She relaxed in Emily's hold.

"Fucking dyke." The guy spat at them, "You know what you really need is a good hard fu…"

The next thing Alison knew, the guy was on the floor, blood gushing from his nose. Emily stood over him.

"You need to leave, now." Spencer was next to Emily. "Take Ali and go back to your moms, I'll deal with this."

Emily grabbed Alison hand and pulled them outside. Ali was in shock, sure the guy was an asshole but she couldn't believe what Emily had done.

"What the hell did you do that for?" She yelled at the brunette.

"I was protecting you." Emily yelled back.

"From what?! You were there, it was over!"

"He insulted you!"

"You can't go around punching everyone that insults me! I think we learned today that would be a lot of people!"

"Just get in the cab Alison!"

"No!"

"What?!" Emily stared at her wide eyed.

"You can't just tell me what to do!" Alison crossed her arms and stood her ground.

"Get in the cab!" Emily shouted again.

"Or what? Hmm? Are you going to punch me?"

Emily's face dropped, "Ali I would never."

Alison sighed, she knew Emily would never hurt her, "Why did you have to do that Emily? If anyone finds out it was me, I can't even think about that right now."

"Please babe," Emily's voice was soft now, "please get in the cab."

Alison got in, this was far from over, but she knew better than to carry it on in the street.

As soon as they got back Emily tried to talk to her about it again. She still seemed a little drunk, Ali didn't want to do this tonight. She was far too angry and she didn't want to cause a scene in front of Pam.

"Emily, go to bed." She said firmly, "You're going to wake your mom up, we'll deal with it in the morning."

"Ali, please." Emily practically begged.

"I'm going to bed." She walked away from her girlfriend and went upstairs to the guest room.

Try as she might she could not sleep. She had been tossing and turning for what felt like hours. She hated that they were in a fight, but she couldn't help but be mad at the brunette. Deciding that she needed a drink of water she got up and quietly tiptoed downstairs. Noticing the light was already on in the kitchen she nearly headed back up, assuming Emily was still up. Her need for a drink won out though and she decided to just get in and out as quickly as she could.

"Couldn't sleep?" Pam asked from her seat at the kitchen table.

"Oh hey, I didn't know you were still up." Alison replied shyly, wondering if Pam had heard their arguing earlier.

"Sometimes I wake up and can't get back to sleep, so I just come and sit a while. It's been that way ever since Wayne died." Pam smiled sadly.

"Well I don't want to bother you, I'll just get some water and leave you to it." Alison went to the fridge.

"You're not bothering me at all, in fact it's nice to have the company. Please, come and sit." Pam gestured to the seat next to her.

Alison hesitantly sat down.

"So what are you and Emily fighting about?" Pam asked as soon as she sat down.

"Fighting?" Alison tried to act surprised at the question.

"Well something was definitely up when you got in and you're sleeping in separate rooms so I just assumed." Pam sipped her tea.

"You know." It was more of a statement from Alison.

"So what did she do?" Pam asked.

"Why do you assume she did something?" Ali suddenly felt defensive of Emily.

"Lucky guess." Pam laughed.

"She punched someone." Alison sighed.

"Why?" If Pam was shocked she didn't seem it.

"He was bothering me at the bar, but she didn't need to hit him." Ali felt herself getting angry again.

"Well I don't condone violence, but Emily is fiercely protective of the people she loves. She's a lot like her father." Pam looked into the distance.

The L word didn't pass Alison by. People seemed to be throwing it around a lot lately.

"So why are you really mad?" Pam asked, drawing her attention back.

"She hit someone." Alison said, as though it was obvious.

"That's everything?" Pam looked at her knowingly.

"I don't want people to know I'm here," Alison sighed, "That guy almost recognised me, what if the police get involved? What if somebody filmed it? It'll be all over the Internet before the sun comes up."

"Well I wouldn't worry about that if Spencer was there." Pam reached over and took her hand.

"Emily could have got into trouble, if she got a record I'd have to fire her." Alison looked down at the table.

"So what you're really mad about is people finding out that you're in a relationship with a woman, but you don't want to lose Emily either?"

Alison just carried on looking at the table, Pam was right.

"I hate to break it to you honey, but you can't have both." Pam spoke firmly.

"It's been going well so far."

"You think Emily is going to want to keep it a secret forever?"

Alison looked up at Pam.

"You don't think that eventually she's going to want to go on holidays? Get married? Start a family?" Pam rubbed the back of Alison's hand.

"I don't know." Alison sighed.

"I think you do, don't you ever think about that stuff?"

"No." It was the truth, Ali never let herself think about any of that stuff. It terrified her.

"Well I think you need to, you need to decide what you want." Pam got up from the table, "Goodnight Ali, if there's one piece of advice I can give you, it's life's too short. You think that person will be there forever but one day they won't be. Just make sure you made the most of your time while you could."

Alison just nodded at her, "Goodnight Pam."

She finished her water and made her way upstairs, reaching the door to the guest room she let her hand rest on the handle. Shaking her head she turned round and headed back down the hall.

"Em?" She asked as she opened the door.

"I'm sorry Ali." Emily sat up in bed.

"I know."

She made her way over the bed and climbed beneath the covers as Emily wrapped herself around her.

"It won't ever happen again." Emily promised as she kissed her hair.

Alison didn't reply, she wasn't sure that Emily would keep that promise. Instead she just snuggled into her embrace and closed her eyes, happy to be back in her girlfriends arms.

When Alison woke up she was alone, it didn't last long though as Emily came bounding thought the door.

"Come on sleepy head, we're going for a walk." She grinned excitedly.

After getting ready in her new disguise they headed out so Emily could give her a tour of the town.

"We couldn't have just driven round?" Alison groaned.

"Nope," Emily said, taking her hand, "You can't drive to all the places I want to take you."

Alison stopped herself from pulling her hand away. Nobody knows it's you, she reminded herself. To be honest, her heart beat a little faster at the gesture. They'd never held hands walking down the street before. She loved the normality of it. Her thoughts drifted back to Pam's words.

"This is where I went to school." Emily gestured to the building.

"Where you won all those trophies." Alison smiled proudly at her.

"That's the place, but then I hurt my shoulder." She looked sad.

"You'll have to take me swimming sometime." Alison held her hand a little tighter.

"Definitely." Emily cheered up at the suggestion.

They walked for what seemed like forever, Emily offering stories for all the different places. Alison loved the town, she would have loved to grow up somewhere like this. She wondered what her life would have been like. How different she might have been.

"That's Spencer's house, well her parents." Emily pointed to a beautiful, large home.

"Looks like her neighbours are selling." Alison noticed the sign outside.

It was a lovely looking house, staring at it she got a feeling in her chest. Suddenly her imagination took over. Her and Emily lived there, in this little town. She taught English at the high school, Emily coached the swim team. She imagined a little Emily running around that home. They were so happy.

"Babe?" Emily's voice broke through her daydream.

Alison suddenly felt sick.

"Are you alright?" Emily moved to stand in front of her.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Alison forced a smile, "Let's carry on."

"Alright, there's just one more place I want to take you." Emily grabbed her hand again and lead her to the woods.

"Is this where you kill me?" Alison joked.

"Aw, I was hoping it would be a surprise." Emily feigned disappointment.

After a fairly short walk they stopped in a clearing.

"We're here." Emily declared.

It didn't look anything spectacular, it was just a clearing with a large rock in it.

"I used to come here to think when I was younger, actually I still do when I'm home." Emily looked around and went and sat on the rock.

"Does it have a name?" Alison asked.

"It does not." Emily answered.

"I think you should give it one." Alison said, moving to sit next to Emily on the rock.

"Like what?"

Alison thought for a moment, "It's the kissing rock."

"The kissing rock?" Emily laughed.

"Yeah, people have been sneaking off to the kissing rock for hundreds of years." Alison continued.

"You're making this up." Emily smirked.

"Just because I make it up, doesn't mean it's not true." Ali stuck her tongue out, "You come here with somebody and you can feel the ghosts of the other lovers spying on you. Pushing you to do it. You know you should never disappoint a ghost." She leaned closer to Emily.

"It's just a dusty old rock." Emily's breath hit her face.

"Who do you want to bring here?" Alison asked, already knowing the answer, she hoped.

Emily closed the gap between them and kissed her passionately. Alison put a hand into her hair, pulling her closer. Suddenly Emily pulled away.

"Ali, I lo.."

Alison quickly closed the gap again, kissing away Emily's words. She knew exactly what she was going to say. As much as she wanted to hear them, she wasn't ready to.

They were interrupted by Emily's phone, dinner was almost ready and they needed to get back.

The walk back was slightly tense, Alison could feel that Emily wanted to say something. She was relieved to find that she didn't.

"Just in time to help with the finishing touches." Pam greeted them as they entered the house.

"What do you need mom?" Emily asked.

"On second thoughts, I rather the dinner wasn't ruined." Pam laughed, "Just go sit down."

"I can help." Ali said, "I want to."

"Well thank you Alison." Pam smiled.

By time everyone arrived everything was pretty much done. Alison had enjoyed helping Pam. It wasn't something she had ever done with her own mother and it was nice to spend time with her. She radiated a warmth she'd only ever received from Martha.

The dinner itself was the most enjoyable one Alison thought she'd ever had. All of Spencer, Aria and Hanna's families and partners had come. It was a squeeze getting everyone in, but they managed. Conversation flowed freely and everyone was treating her like a normal person. She was genuinely happy to be there.

"Quiet please," Pam said standing up, "I'll go first this year, thank you all for coming, it's a pleasure to have you here. I'm thankful for every single one of you." She smiled and sat back down.

One by one they started going around the table, each person saying what they were thankful for. This wasn't something Alison had ever done before. Emily was next and then it would be her, she felt nervous. What should she say?

"I'm thankful for a lot of things this year," Emily began, "I'm thankful for coming home in one piece, I'm thankful for my wonderful friends and family and I'm thankful for getting the best job in the world."

She took Alison's hand under the table and gave it a squeeze.

"I have a lot to be thankful for, I know that," Alison tried to steady her nerves, "I'm thankful for everyone here, you've all been so kind and welcoming to me. I'm thankful for everything that's happened to me in the last year," she squeezed Emily's hand back, "and I'm really thankful that I came here."

Everyone just smiled warmly at her and they continued round the table. Emily's hand never leaving her own.

It was late when everyone finally left. After helping clear up they made their way up to bed, knowing they had to be up early.

"I really am thankful I came here." Alison said as they got into bed.

"I'm thankful you came too." Emily leaned over and kissed her.

"This town is amazing, I think I know what my story is going to be."

"Really?" Emily propped herself up on her elbow and grinned at her.

"Yeah, I'm going to start writing when we get back." Ali pushed her down so she could lay on her chest.

"That sounds like a great idea." Emily wrapped her arms around her.

This trip had given her a lot of inspiration, and not just for her story. She had gotten a glimpse of what life could be like with Emily. The future that they could have, how her life could be if she just gave it all up. If she stopped caring about her other world, her real world. She found herself questioning more and more which one her real world really was though. What scared her the most though, was that she couldn't stop thinking about that house. That future with Emily. Pam was right, she needed to decide what she wanted.

It was a sad goodbye the next morning. Only her and Emily were leaving, she had to be back in the city for work.

"Thank you so much for everything." Alison said, hugging Pam tightly.

"Anytime, I'll see you at Christmas." Pam hugged her just as tight.

"Christmas?" Alison questioned, she wasn't against coming back, but that was the one holiday her family actually spent together and it would be difficult to get out of it.

"Yeah, mom's coming to the city." Emily explained.

"Oh, well yes I suppose I'll see you at some point then." The thought made Alison happy.

"I'm going to nap I think." Emily yawned from her seat on the plane.

"Okay." Alison nodded and played with her hands nervously.

"Everything alright?" Emily asked, cocking her head.

"Yeah, I just don't want to have to go back to work." Alison pulled a face.

"Me neither." She replied laughing.

Alison rolled her eyes as Emily shut hers, then she sat there wondering when exactly she should tell her that she'd bought them a house.

 **So there we have it, loved it? Hated it? Couldn't care less, you're just here for the free words? Let me know. Also, why not share a fun fact about yourself? I'll go first, I really love socks.**


	12. Chapter 12

**Evening all, hope you had the most festive of Yuletide's and the happiest of Hogmanay's! Thank you for your lovely reviews on the last chapter, that made me happy because let's be honest, we're all friends here, my work has gone downhill a bit. Anyway I appreciate those of you that did your homework, made some fun reading for me and I feel like I know you all a little better now. So on with the show...**

Emily loudly began to sing yet another Christmas song as she put the finishing touches to the tree in Alison's living room. Unlike Emily, Alison did not seem to care much about the holiday. She wasn't even planning on getting a tree at all until Emily had argued with her about it for a solid twenty four hours. An argument that the brunette had eventually won.

"Are you nearly done?" Alison entered the room with a pained expression on her face.

"Almost," Emily grinned in return, "just need to put the star on top." She held out the topper to her girlfriend.

"Well hurry up and put it on, your mom gets here in a few hours and I want to cuddle and watch a film." Alison pouted.

"You need to do it." Emily continued to hold out the star.

"Why?" Alison huffed.

"It's your tree." Emily continued to grin, beckoning the girl over.

"Could've fooled me." Alison rolled her eyes, walking over.

"Come on Scrooge, where's your Christmas spirit?" Emily laughed.

"In the drinks cabinet, labelled vodka." Alison quipped as she took the star out of Emily's hand.

Despite her girlfriends lack of festive spirit, Emily couldn't imagine a better Christmas. She finally had the girl of her dreams and she was happier than she'd ever been. However Alison had been a little off ever since they'd come back from Rosewood. At first Emily thought it had been because of her near declaration of feelings, so she'd made a point not to broach the subject again. That didn't seem to be it though. It was almost like she was hiding something from her. Emily had been made more suspicious of that two days ago when Alison took a call in another room. Something she never did. When Emily had gone in to ask her something she had abruptly stopped speaking and hung up. She was also becoming over generous with her money. It ranged from small things, like insisting she pay for Pam's travel, all the way to trying to trying to pay for all of Emily's Christmas shopping. Last week they'd ended up in an argument because Emily wouldn't let her buy her a car. It was all very strange, Emily wanted to talk to her about it, but she had decided to wait until the holidays were over.

"How the hell am I going to reach up there?" Alison stood staring at Emily with her hands on her hips.

"I'll give you a boost." Emily went round the back of her, bending down and putting her head between the blondes legs. She straightened up easily so that Alison was now on her shoulders.

"Don't you dare drop me." Alison warned, one hand gripping Emily's head tightly as she leaned to place the star on top of the tree, "Done, now let me down."

Emily crouched down so that Alison could jump off. She grabbed her girlfriends hand and pulled her toward her as she stood back up.

"What?" Alison giggled at the mischievous look on Emily's face.

Emily reached into her back pocket, pulled out a sprig of mistletoe and held it above their heads.

"You're a dork." Alison sighed as she leaned in to kiss her.

Emily let go of her hand and pulled her phone out, snapping a picture of them mid kiss.

"What are you doing?" Alison quickly pulled away.

"We look cute," Emily smiled, "plus there are no pictures of us together where I'm not walking three feet behind you."

"There's a reason for that, phones can be hacked." Alison looked angry.

"Relax, Caleb is my tech guy. I'm assured that this phone is unhackable." She placed a gentle kiss to Ali's lips, trying to remove the anger.

"How sure can you be about that?" Alison didn't look convinced.

"Well none of my nudes have been leaked so…"

This earned her a punch to the arm.

"Well I hope you're right, for both our sakes." Alison warned before turning to leave.

"Where are you going?" Emily called after her.

"To find my Christmas spirit." Ali called back over her shoulder.

Emily stood at the station awaiting Pam's arrival. She'd had a lovely afternoon of cuddles and make out sessions on the couch with Alison. Some random Christmas movie playing in the background that neither of them paid any attention to. Something was still not right though. It was hell to leave her, she was excited to see her mom, but she really wished she could spend the holiday with both of them.

"Emily!" Pam rushed toward her daughter, breaking her out of her thoughts and embraced her.

"Hey mom." Emily squeezed her back tightly, "Come on, there's a car waiting."

"No Alison?" Pam questioned as she climbed into the back of the car.

"No, she's spending the holiday with her parents. I'm seeing her in the morning for an hour to exchange gifts." She couldn't keep the sad note out of her voice.

"It won't always be this way Emmy." Pam smiled softly at her.

"I'm not so sure." Emily mumbled.

"I don't know, that girl may surprise you. I have every faith in her."

"You do?" Emily looked at her mother.

"I do."

"Mrs F!" Hanna greeted enthusiastically as they entered the apartment.

"Hello Hanna." Pam laughed.

"Here, let me grab your bags." Caleb said rushing to the door to help them.

"Thank you for having me." Pam hugged Hanna.

"Of course, you are cooking Christmas dinner right?" Hanna said seriously.

"No, she is not." Emily scolded, "Me and Hanna have it all under control."

"Yes, I am." Pam chuckled, "I think we'd all like to survive until the 26th."

"When do your mom and Ted get back?" Pam asked as she followed Hanna through to the kitchen.

Emily checked her phone again, hoping to see a message from a certain blonde. Her screen remained blank. She knew that Alison was trying not to interrupt her time with her mom, but it didn't make her miss her any less.

"Everything alright?" Pam said as she entered the room.

"Yeah, everything's great." Emily smiled back at her.

"You know I was thinking, it's going to be pretty crowded here the next couple of days. We're already going to have to share a bed for two nights at least. Why don't you stay at Alison's tonight?"

"Mom, I want to spend time with you." Emily protested.

"I know and I want to spend time with you too. We've got most of the day tomorrow though, all of Christmas Day and most of the 26th. The holidays are about spending time with the people you love. You should spend time with everyone that you love."

"Thanks mom." Emily smiled gratefully.

"Just make sure you take the present that I got her."

"You really didn't have to get her a present." Emily sighed.

"I wanted to, and you don't get to decide who I buy presents for." Pam said as she disappeared to get it.

Emily let herself into Alison's, excited to surprise her girlfriend. She walked as quietly as she could through the downstairs. Not so quiet that Pepe didn't hear her though.

"Shh boy," She whispered, "Where's your mama?"

Walking into the kitchen she noticed large envelope on the counter. It was addressed to her, Miss Emily Fields. The address was Alison's though. Why would she be getting any mail sent here? It was already open. She pulled out the documents from inside and began to study them.

"What are you doing here?" Alison's voice startled her as she dropped the papers on the counter.

"I came to surprise you. I was going to spend the night here." Emily said, spinning round to face Ali, who was stood at the doorway in a nightshirt. She was still in shock from what she'd just read.

"Why are you looking through my things?" Alison's voice was defensive.

"Your things?" Emily felt herself getting angry, "Pretty sure it's addressed to me."

"Emily, you don't know what that's about." Alison moved further into the kitchen.

"Really? I'm not an idiot Alison. A house? I say no to a car and you just think, well I'll just buy her a house without telling her then?" Emily could feel the frustration bubbling.

"It's not like that…" Alison's voice trailed off.

"Well then what is it like? You think I can't look after myself?"

"No, I mean yes. I know you can look after yourself." Alison was getting flustered.

"So what then? I don't get you Ali. I've been patient, I thought we were getting somewhere. I thought you were happy. Then when we were in Rosewood…it was like you didn't want to hear it. I get that, I do. It's scary. I don't care about you saying it back, I don't."

Alison looked down at the floor and started playing with her hands.

"Since we got back, you've been different. You've been off, you're hiding things from me. It's like you're just throwing your money at me, like if you do that then you don't have to give me any of you. I don't care about your money though Ali! I don't want your money, I want you! I love you!" She had said it.

"Please don't." Alison's voice was quiet.

"Don't what? Love you?" Emily questioned, "Too late. I love you Ali."

"How do you know that you love me? How do you know that it's not just some illusion." Alison's eyes still didn't meet hers.

"Because I know. I know I love you, because I love everything about about you. Even the things about you I don't like, I love. So yeah, I am completely, utterly, unapologetically, head over heels in love with you."

"Emily, I…" Alison was at a loss for words, but Emily could see the tears threatening her eyes.

"I'm not Rollins, I'm not the guy who tried to sell a story about you, I'm not any of those assholes you've dated in the past. I'm me, I'm Emily and I'm yours." Emily could feel tears in her own eyes now, "But if you don't want me, then you need to tell me Ali. I want a future with you, but you have to want that too. You can't just throw money at me."

She walked forward until she was nose to nose with the blonde. Grabbing her by the waist, she forcefully brought her mouth to Ali's. Kissing her with passion, relieved when Alison responded with just as much enthusiasm. She began to walk backwards, pulling Ali with her. Spinning them round once they reached the counters, she lifted her onto it and shifted her legs so she was now between them. She began placing wet kisses down her jaw to her neck, reaching for the hem of Ali's shirt and swiftly pulling it over her head. She discarded it without thought and resumed her assault on the blondes neck. Alison's hands were tangled in her hair, her legs wrapped firmly around her waist pulling her closer.

"Emily." Alison moaned throwing her head back.

"Tell me that you want me too." Emily breathed out between kisses, "Tell me that you see a future for us."

When Alison didn't respond Emily pulled away. Resting her forehead against Ali's.

"Do you see a future for us Alison?" Emily asked, eyes staring into Alison's own lust filled orbs.

Alison moved to kiss Emily again, moving her hands to unbutton her jeans. Emily pulled away and stepped back.

"I love you Alison, and I'll carry on being patient. I just have to know that this is going somewhere for you too."

Alison remained silent, sat half naked on the counter, eyes avoiding Emily's.

"Well when you decide what you want, let me know." Emily turned to leave, "Merry Christmas Ali."

Alison burst into tears as soon as she heard the door shut. Why didn't she just tell her the truth? What the hell was wrong with her? Fighting back her tears, she got up and put her nightshirt back on. Then she went to her laptop and did the only thing that seemed to give her any clarity recently, she began to write. The story had formed quickly in her head during her visit to Rosewood. She wondered if any of her inspirations would recognise themselves. The one she cared most about though was gone, trying to work through her feelings she began to type out a new chapter.

"Emily?" Pam's head whipped up in surprise as Emily slammed the door behind her.

"I'm going to bed." Emily didn't look at the people in the room as she stalked through the apartment.

Slamming her bedroom door like a teenager, she sat on the bed and put her head in her hands. She hadn't meant to leave, she didn't want to have this conversation now, not during the holidays. That envelope though, it had really pissed her off. Not only had she bought her a house without asking, or telling her, she had bought it in Rosewood. It was like she wanted to hide her away. Out of sight, no chance of them ever just being a normal couple. She had been patient, she had tried, but she needed answers now.

"Emmy?" Pam's gentle voice disturbed her swirling thoughts.

"I'm sorry I slammed the door." Emily felt stupid for her juvenile behaviour.

"I'm more concerned about why, and why you're not at Alison's right now?" Pam came and sat next to her on the bed.

"She bought me a house." Emily scoffed.

"Well I can see why you'd be angry."

"You can?" Emily looked at her mother gratefully.

"Yeah, I mean who would do such a nice thing? You need to steer clear of generous people like her." Pam's face had the hint of a smirk.

"No, it's not just the house mom, it's what it represents." Emily put her head back in her hands.

"What would that be?"

"She's just been really strange recently, since we got back from Rosewood." Emily tried to explain.

"In what way?"

"She's been, distant. Well not distant, she's still affectionate and…I don't know, it's like she's just never fully there at the moment. I feel like she's hiding something from me."

"Okay." Pam nodded, urging her to continue.

"Then she's just trying to buy me stuff left, right and centre. Not cheap stuff either, like she can just use money instead of feelings. The house isn't even in New York mom! It's in Rosewood, she lives in New York! It's like she just wants me out of the way. She just doesn't want a real future with me, she doesn't want to be a normal couple."

"Did she say that?"

"She didn't have to, she didn't say anything and that speaks volumes." Emily could feel herself getting upset.

"Have you ever thought that maybe you're wrong?"

"About what?" Emily sat up to look at her mother again.

"All of it, or at least some of it."

Emily just sat in silence, staring at her mother in disbelief.

"I'm just saying, maybe she doesn't seem all there because she's working through her feelings. Maybe she's thinking about what she does want. You might be right about the money, but have you ever thought about where she comes from? It's not exactly the Waltons Emily, maybe that's the way she knows how to show she cares. You say she's hiding something, my guess is it's the house. Speaking of the house, where is the only place you've been able to act like a normal couple Emily? Walk down the street holding hands, hang out with friends in a bar? You say she doesn't want a future, I say this is a huge leap forward for you both. I think you need to talk to her."

Emily processed everything her mother had said, try as she might, she couldn't find fault. It made sense.

"No." Emily said forcefully, she had made up her mind.

"No?" Pam asked in confusion.

"It's always me, this time it needs to be her. When she's ready to talk to me she will. If she wants to fight for this, then I need to see that."

"Well that's your decision." Pam said, kissing Emily's forehead and getting up, "Get some sleep sweetie."

As soon as Pam left, she dropped her stoic and strong act and let a tear fall. She needed to stick to her guns, she doubted she'd get much sleep tonight though.

Christmas Eve had passed as a none event for Alison. She never even got dressed or left the house. Cancelling her plans, she spent the whole day writing. If she carried on at this rate, she'd be finished in a week. It cleared her head, helped her think, work through her feelings. It didn't stop her from crying herself to sleep at night though.

Christmas Day was upon her, it filled her with dread. For two reasons, she had to spend the entire day with her family and she hadn't spoken to Emily since that night. She honestly thought the brunette would have come over by now, or called, or text, anything. However it was becoming increasingly apparent that she had meant what she said. This only made Alison more stubborn though, how dare she walk out on her? Tell her that she loved her, and then just leave? She was not going to be the one to call first.

She paused before she left the house, turning to go into the living room, she stared at the five gifts Emily had left for her under her tree. Taking a deep breath she approached the tree and knelt down. Picking up the first one, she read the tag, it was from Aria and Ezra. She carefully unwrapped the gift to discover a gorgeous scarf, it wasn't designer, it probably didn't cost that much, but it was the best scarf Alison had ever owned. Moving to the next one, it said Hanna and Caleb. She could have guessed that from the wrapping though, she chuckled to herself. Opening up her presents one by one, she was thrilled by her gifts. Hanna had got her pyjamas, Spencer had gotten her a beautiful new diary. Pam had got her a lovely bottle of wine and a card with an invite to visit anytime. She was truly moved by each gift. Finally she got to Emily's, the small package weighed heavily in her hands. Biting the bullet she unwrapped it and opened the box. Inside was a gold necklace with a heart pendant. It was stunning. Her phone chimed to alert her that her car was waiting, she quickly put the box into her handbag and left.

Christmas with the DiLaurentis' was exactly how she expected it to be. While she was certain that other family's would be enjoying festive cheer, laughing and joking, helping to cook the dinner, they did not. Instead they all sat around the room, stony faced, sipping their drinks while the help that was missing out on Christmas with their own families prepared them a feast. There was no gathering around the tree to open presents. Instead her father just muttered something about a bank transfer. Jason looked in pain as he sipped his club soda. Ali felt bad for him, she knew she wouldn't be able to get through the day without a drink. She got her phone out and quickly typed out a holiday tweet to her followers, she would get an Instagram picture later. Opening up snapchat she clicked on Hanna Marin's story. It was snap after snap of how Christmas morning should be. Emily didn't appear except for in the background, Alison strained her eyes to try and get a good look at her. She looked miserable.

"What are you watching?" Jason asked from across the room.

"Just a snap story." Alison shrugged it off as if it was barely of interest.

"Well they sound like they're having a good Christmas." He smiled, before gesturing round the room, "Hard to beat this though."

"Oh yeah, time of my life." Alison scoffed and rolled her eyes, enjoying joking around with her brother.

"Dinner is ready." Her father announced as he entered to the room.

They ate in uncomfortable silence, as always. It was more about pretending to be the perfect family than actually being one. She didn't want that for her kids, Christmas would be a fun holiday. They would get up early and have a special breakfast before opening all their presents together. She'd make the dinner with Pam while Emily kept the kids entertained…

"Alison are you alright?" Jason's voice was laced with concern, "You've gone really pale."

"Yes, I just felt a bit lightheaded." She forced a smile, "I'm fine now."

There her imagination went again, and once again the only future she did see for herself was with Emily. The woman that she was close to losing. At this stage she realised, try as she might, she couldn't imagine any kind of future without her. She popped up time after time. What annoyed her more though, was that rather than spending this day with that future, she was sat in a room of people she had no interest in being in her future at all. Worst of all, Emily had no idea that Alison had these thoughts. She believed that Alison didn't care, and her Christmas was just as miserable because of her.

"Where are you going?" Jessica's voice brought her back to the room.

Alison looked down to see that she had stood up.

"Is there a problem Alison?" Her father asked, sipping his wine.

Deciding that this would be the first stand of many she was going to have to take against her family, she mustered all the confidence she could.

"I'm leaving."

"You're what?" Jessica nearly choked on her drink.

"I don't know why we even bother doing this every year, none of us want to be here. So this is my last year and I'm done. I'll see you all at the New Years ball."

Before an argument could break out or she could lose her nerve, Alison quickly left the room and marched out of the house. Which is where she encountered her first problem. She didn't have a car, a random driver had brought her over this morning and she had no idea of how to contact him.

"Alison!"

She turned around to see Jason stood in the doorway.

"I don't know who they are, but I'm glad you're happy. Here." He smirked, tossing a set of keys to her, "God knows the last time you actually had to drive, so please be careful."

"Thank you Jason." Alison smiled at him gratefully.

"Merry Christmas little sister." He returned the smile and turned to go back inside.

Jason was right, Alison couldn't even remember the last time she had actually driven. Programming the sat nav, she tried to get comfortable with the vehicle. Hoping for the best she set off to her destination.

"Okay Emily, your turn!" Hanna handed her the mouthpiece.

"I think I'm going to pass on this one." Emily tried to smile at her best friend, but she knew it wasn't reaching her eyes.

"You've passed on all the games." Hanna pouted, she'd been trying to cheer Emily up all day.

"Why don't we just watch some television?" Pam suggested, Emily smiled at her appreciatively.

They had been sitting watching some Christmas film on Netflix, Emily wasn't even paying attention. Instead her head continued to swirl with thoughts of a certain blonde. This wasn't a decision she wanted to be making on Christmas Day. A knock on the door brought her back to the room.

"Did you invite someone round?" Hanna asked Caleb, who shrugged and shook his head.

"Might be a neighbour?" Pam suggested.

"Well let's find out." Hanna got up and headed out into the hallway.

Not giving it a second thought, Emily allowed herself to get consumed by her thoughts again.

"Em, can you come here a second." Hanna's voice sounded strange.

Sighing in annoyance, Emily pulled herself up off the couch and headed through the hall.

"Merry Christmas." Alison said with a shy smile.

"I'm just gonna…" Hanna pointed to the living room before making her exit.

"Thank you Hanna." Alison smiled, before turning her attention back to Emily.

"What are you doing here?"

"Can we talk?" Alison looked nervous.

"Sure, we can talk in my room." Emily motioned for her to follow. Happy that her mom was staying so at least it would be clean and tidy.

"This is nice." Alison said as she followed Emily in, who sat down on the bed.

Alison continued to stand in front of her.

"Yeah it is, I'm going to be moving out soon though. Need to find my own place." Emily rubbed the back of her neck.

Alison still continued to just stand there.

"You said you wanted to talk?" Emily tried to prompt her to say something, anything.

"Yeah, I did. I don't know why I find this so damn hard." Alison laughed, but there wasn't any humour in it.

"It's just me Ali, you can say anything to me." Emily tried to reassure the nervous woman in front of her, "Why aren't you at your parents?"

"Because I realised that's not what I wanted for my Christmas, for this one or any of them. I want Christmas like you." Alison paused and corrected herself, "I want Christmas with you."

"You do?" Emily felt hope rise inside her.

"I do."

"This year or…?" Emily tried to push her for more.

"Every year." Alison said, looking down.

Emily stood off the bed and walked the two steps to be in front of her girlfriend. It was good enough for her, "I want that too Ali."

Alison looked up and stared into Emily's eyes, "I'm sorry that I make all of this so difficult."

"It's a good job you're worth it." Emily smirked, before gently cupping Alison's jaw and kissing her. She pulled away after a moment and whispered against Ali's mouth, "I love you."

Alison just closed the gap again and wrapped her arms around Emily's neck.

"I am trying, I just need a little time." Alison said quietly once they'd separated again.

"I know." Emily sighed, she should be canonised in her opinion for displaying this level of patience.

"Just give me until after New Years?" Alison asked, cocking her head.

"You got it." Emily couldn't help the grin that was now plastered on her face, "So you want a proper Christmas?"

"I do." Alison grinned back.

"Well come on then," she said dragging her out of her bedroom and through the apartment, "time to play Hanna's games."

Emily had ended up having one of the best Christmas' she'd ever had. Something she wasn't expecting at all considering how they'd left things before. Alison had actually fought for her. It wasn't a boom box outside the window but it was Alison's equivalent. Sure she hadn't outright said, I want a future with you, but she had said she wanted Christmas'. That was basically the same thing and Emily was going to take it happily at this stage. Especially Alison's declaration of just giving her until after new year. Emily wasn't exactly sure what that meant, or what was going to happen, but it sounded promising.

"Babe where the hell are my shoes?!"

"They're down here!" Hanna shouted up the stairs.

"I don't think she was talking to you." Emily rolled her eyes at the blonde.

"Thank you!"

"Are you sure about that?" Hanna smirked back.

Alison's glam squad had been reduced to one single person, Hanna. Emily was amazed she had downsized so drastically. Alison had simply pointed out that Hanna could do everything that she usually paid five people to do, so why not just pay her. It seemed to be an arrangement that everyone was happy with.

"What time is it?" Alison appeared halfway down the stairs in her underwear.

Emily gulped and tried to maintain her composure. It was only a few hours earlier she'd had the blonde bent over the kitchen counter.

"You have half an hour until we're out the door." Hanna answered, chuckling at Emily's seeming inability to function.

"Okay, this is doable. I'm putting my dress on. Can you help me Han?" Alison asked as she turned to walk back up the stairs.

"Sure thing, I'll bring your shoes." Hanna answered, nudging Emily as she walked past, "Jealous?"

"Of you dressing my girlfriend?" Emily raised her eyebrows, "As long as I'm the only one undressing her, you dress away."

It hadn't taken Emily long to get ready, all of the security at the event were told they had to wear black and blend in. So Hanna had dressed her in black trousers and jacket. No shirt. She hope to god that she had enough tape holding this all together.

"Right, she is ready. Let's do this." Hanna squealed as she ran down the stairs.

Alison appeared just after her and Emily was speechless again. Hanna had designed her a strapless white gown. She looked stunning, Emily couldn't help but imagine their wedding day. She shook the thought away, she was getting ahead of herself.

"Baby, you look…" Emily couldn't finish her sentence.

"Thank you." Alison blushed a little, "You're looking pretty hot yourself." She winked.

"Tha…"

"You're welcome." Hanna interrupted, a grin on her face.

Emily and Alison just shared a knowing look and rolled their eyes, before heading out the door.

"I'll meet you there." Hanna smiled as they got into the waiting car.

Alison had invited all of her new friends and their partners to the event. Emily thought it was a very sweet gesture, she didn't have to do that. There was always the risk that it would raise questions, Alison had just said that they wouldn't even be noticed though. Apparently this was the new year event of all new year events. The DiLaurentis New Year ball was the place to be tonight. People would sell the rights to their first borns for a ticket. At least this is what Hanna had told her, before she assured a very concerned looking Caleb that they had been given their tickets legitimately.

"In three hours it'll be a brand new year." Emily smiled and took Alison's hand in the back of the car.

"It will be," Alison smiled back, "it will also be time to renew your contract."

"Really? Wow, has it been six months already?"

"It has." Alison nodded.

"It seems like years." Emily groaned playfully.

Alison just threw her a look, but didn't rise to the bait.

"Have a lovely night ladies, and a happy new year." Carter addressed them as he pulled the car up outside the building.

"Happy new year Carter!" They both chorused.

Emily got out and went round to open Alison's door, the amount of people gathered was crazy. Emily hadn't seen anything like this yet. Between the press and the fans, it was just a sea of people. She opened the door and Alison stepped out. The noise level increased to an uncomfortable amount. Emily winced, Alison just looked like she was just casually walking down the street. If she was overwhelmed you couldn't tell. Her name was being shouted from every direction as she walked the carpet, stopping to pose, sign autographs and take selfies with fans along the way. It took them forty five minutes to make it to the entrance.

"I'll be glad when I don't have to do that anymore." Alison muttered as they entered.

"What?" Emily questioned, but Alison had already moved in and started greeting people. She made a mental note to ask her about her comment later.

"This party is insane." Aria had come to talk to her.

She'd been stood on the sidelines watching Alison mingle for the last two hours.

"Yes it is." Spencer joined them.

"Don't be getting me in trouble guys, you're guests. I shouldn't be talking to you." Emily addressed them while continuing to stare straight ahead.

"Oh lighten up Em, it's new year!" Hanna was well on her way to being drunk.

"Easy for you to say, when it gets to midnight you'll get to kiss the person you love." Emily couldn't help but sound a little bitter.

"I thought things were good with you guys?" Aria questioned.

"They are," Emily sighed, "I'm allowed to be a little annoyed about this though."

"I'll drink to that." Hanna raised her glass.

"You'll drink to anything right now," Spencer rolled her eyes, "Come on, let's find the guys, see you soon Em."

Once again Emily was left alone, just staring at Alison. A dark haired woman that Emily hadn't met before had approached her girlfriend. Emily recognised her as Mona Vanderwaal, she had seen her in Hanna's magazines. She handed Alison a glass of champagne and turned on the charm, from what Emily could see. Emily wasn't buying it though, she didn't trust Mona at all, judging from Alison's fake smile, she wasn't buying it either. She politely excused herself and headed over to speak to someone that Emily thought might have won an Oscar. She really needed to start reading more of Hanna's magazines if she wasn't going to embarrass herself and Alison at these things. She looked at the large clock on the wall, it was ten minutes until midnight. Putting her focus back on Alison she sighed and hoped the time would pass quickly until they could go home.

"Five minutes to midnight folks! So charge your glasses and get ready!" Mr DiLaurentis announced as people cheered.

Alison's eyes met Emily's and she motioned her head toward the exit, before heading toward it. Emily followed, unsure of what Alison wanted. Alison continued toward the elevator and nodded at the operator who opened it and let her in, Emily rushed to get in. They rode in silence until they reached the top floor, Alison exited first, Emily once again following diligently.

"What's going on?" She finally asked once they were alone in the penthouse.

"In just over a minute, it's going to be midnight. Now we can stand down there and pretend to be happy, or we can stay up here and bring it in together." Alison said, moving closer and taking her hands.

"Won't anyone notice that you're missing?" Emily questioned.

"Nope." Alison smiled, she seemed a bit drunk.

"How much have you had to drink Ali?" She was sure she'd only noticed her have about three drinks.

"No idea." Alison shrugged, then she gestured to the clock, "Ten, nine, eight…"

She began the countdown and Emily joined in, "Three, two, one."

Emily could hear fireworks going off as Alison kissed her. It was filled with passion and Emily was pretty sure love.

"Happy new year Emily." Alison breathed as she pulled away.

"Happy new year Alison." Emily moved to kiss her again.

"New year, new us." Alison speech sounded slurred.

"Babe, are you okay?" Emily was getting concerned now.

"You must be one hell of a kisser, you've made me very lightheaded." Alison giggled.

"Whose room is this?" Emily asked, wondering if she could just put the blonde to bed.

"My parents, we can't stay here. We haven't spoken since the Christmas Day thing." Alison leaned on Emily.

"Shit, come on." Emily scooped her up and carried her to the elevator.

She dialled the number for the car on the way, it was a replacement driver, she really wished Carter hadn't been given the rest of the night off. She told the driver to meet her out the back. Hopefully he had signed a non disclosure form too.

Once she was in the elevator she dialled Spencer's number, "Happy new year Em! Where are you?"

"I think Alison has been spiked." She cut straight to the chase, "I need you to help me get her out of here."

"I'll grab the others, we're on it." Spencer said, "Where are you?"

"I'll be in the lobby in a minute." Emily answered as Alison placed sloppy kisses on her cheek.

"We'll meet you there." Then Spencer hung up.

"Emmy!" Alison sung.

"Oh no, you don't call me that." Emily laughed a little, but she was more concerned than anything.

"I think they'll call you mom, I'd like to be mama." Alison looked past Emily, deep in thought.

"What?" Emily nearly broke her neck twisting her head.

"Rosewood is going to be great for us, I'm so glad I got us the house." She continued as though this was the most normal conversation in the world.

Emily almost wanted to hit the emergency stop and just sit and ask Alison a million questions right now, sadly this was not the time. The elevator doors opened in the lobby, just as Alison, still in Emily's arms, cupped her face and placed another sloppy kiss on her cheek. Flash.

Instead of Spencer and the girls, a photographer stood in front of the doors with a smirk of triumph on his face. He was going to be getting one hell of a payday.

"Hey!" Spencer yelled as she ran over, but the photographer turned on his heel and fled out of the doors.

"What did he get?" Aria asked.

"We'll deal with it tomorrow, right now let's get her out of here without further incident." Emily's head was spinning with all that had just happened.

Together they managed to shield Alison and get her out of the building and into the waiting car.

"Text us when you get back." Spencer ordered, before shutting the door.

Alison just cuddled up to Emily in the back, luckily she didn't say or do anything else.

When they reached the house Emily picked her out of the car, thanked the driver and took her up to bed.

She had so many questions she wanted to ask the blonde right now, but she knew it would be wrong to do it with Alison so vulnerable. Instead she just tucked her into bed, before settling next to her so she could watch her throughout the night.

"Love you." She whispered into her hair as she kissed her goodnight.

"I love you too." Alison mumbled back.

"Tell me again in the morning." Emily said sadly.

 **Alright, you know the drill, write some words that express your feelings. Or don't. What I would like you to do this time though (that's right, more homework) is weigh in on the scone/scone debate. Does it rhyme with cone or gone? Answers on a postcard please. Much love!**


	13. Chapter 13

**Insert old Rose titanic meme, "It's been 84 years..." My sincerest apologies for the absence. I could be honest and tell you that I lost all motivation and couldn't be arsed, but let's go for 'abducted by aliens instead'. Here's chapter 13, I think, is it 13? Meh, whatever number it is its here and I am working on wrapping this thing up and giving you an ending so we can all sleep better at night. So on with the show, I believe when we last saw our characters they were trapped in the bunker surrounded by the Russians...they weren't? Oh well you may be really confused by this chapter then...**

When Alison awoke the next morning her head felt like there was a brass band marching through it. She groaned and attempted to open her eyes.

"Hey," She heard Emily's voice next to her, it was laced with concern, "How are you feeling?"

"Like hell." Alison replied, shutting her eyes again, "How much did I drink?"

"Do you remember anything from last night?" Emily's voice still sounded very concerned.

Alison desperately searched her memory, "I remember going up to the penthouse, then it all gets a little fuzzy."

"You got spiked." Emily said, anger now replacing the concern.

"How?" Alison attempted to open her eyes again and sit up.

"I'm not entirely positive, but I think it was…"

"Mona." Alison finished off her sentence with a sigh.

"Yeah, I don't have any proof though."

Alison managed to sit up in the bed and turned to Emily, "So what did she get?"

Emily rubbed the back of her neck and didn't meet Alison's searching eyes.

"Oh god," Alison felt sick, "Was I an absolute mess?"

"A bit." Emily still didn't meet her eyes.

"What did the paps get?" Alison was getting irritated that Emily wasn't being very forthcoming with information, "Did I stumble out of the doors? Did I say something embarrassing?"

"You said a lot of things." Emily mumbled, looking away.

"Emily, tell me what I said? What did they get?" Alison was feeling frantic now.

"They didn't get you saying anything." Emily still wasn't looking at her, "Do you remember anything that you said?" Emily's voice had a hopeful tone to it.

"I don't remember anything." Alison shook her head, it wasn't a pleasant sensation.

"Oh." The hopeful tone changed to disappointment.

"What did I say?" Alison was still desperately trying to get her brain to remember anything.

"I'm sure you'll remember if it was important."

Alison felt too much like shit to be playing this cryptic game with Emily. She was losing patience, "What aren't you telling me Emily?"

Emily took a deep breath and finally met Alison's eyes, "Someone got a picture."

"Of what?" Panic set in.

"When I realised you'd been spiked, I picked you up and got you in the elevator." Emily stopped, as though mentally preparing herself, "I phoned Spencer to meet us in the lobby, the plan was to get you out the back…" Emily's voice tapered off.

"What happened Emily?" Alison's voice had a hard edge to it.

"Someone beat them to the elevator, I assume it was Mona's plan to get you falling drunkenly out of it or something…" Emily voice started to shake.

"A photographer?" Alison tried to force any memory to appear in her mind, but she had nothing.

"Yeah, a photographer." Emily looked down and began to fidget with her hands, "When the doors opened you kissed me on the cheek and I'm pretty sure he got a picture of it."

Alison scrambled out of bed, "Where's my phone?!"

"It's in your bag." Emily still didn't look up to meet her eyes.

Alison, still unsteady on her feet, staggered across the room to her bag and pulled her phone out.

"I mean, is it really the end of the world?" Emily finally looked up.

"Are you kidding? This is a fucking disaster!" Alison spat back at her, unlocking her phone expecting to see hundreds of messages and missed calls.

"You kissed your girlfriend on New Years, it's not the worlds biggest scandal." Emily's voice had a hint of anger to it now.

"Exactly! Of course it'll be the worlds biggest scandal today!" Alison couldn't understand why Emily couldn't grasp the severity of the situation.

"It was only on the cheek anyway, I mean I was holding you in my arms, but it could all be worse." Emily said, as if it made it all ok.

"It's enough, once the press get a hold of this story I'm screwed." Alison snapped.

"But you said to give you until New Years, I assumed that meant we could stop hiding this."

"Well that's exactly why you shouldn't assume things!" She looked back at her phone, shocked to discover only generic Happy new year messages from some people and one from her father's secretary requesting she and Emily attend a meeting at 11am to discuss the latter's contract. She quickly opened the Internet and searched her name, it was just the usual, nothing to indicate that the photograph had indeed been taken.

"How bad is it?" Emily's voice broke through her confusion.

"It's not, there's nothing there. He must have missed the shot." Alison looked up from her phone, "We have to meet with my father at 11am to renew your contract, but that's it."

"We? Why do you need to come? And seriously, on New Year's Day?"

"I have no idea, we haven't spoken since Christmas Day. Maybe he just sees it as a way to make me come into the office, it's not strange him working today." Alison was just as confused by the request as Emily, but it was the only explanation that made sense. Right now she was just relieved that she'd had a lucky escape, "We have an hour, better start getting ready."

She moved to head to the bathroom when Emily's voice stopped her again.

"Are we going to talk about the fact that absolutely nothing has changed?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean it's a brand new year and we're still in exactly the same place. If the picture had come out then at least we could stop hiding, it wouldn't be the ideal way for it to happen, but we'd be able to move forward at least."

"Did you want the picture to come out?" Alison couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"I didn't WANT it no, but I'm just asking, do you have any intention of this ever coming out at all?" Emily's voice was unmistakably angry now.

"Well I have no intention of it coming out like this! You just don't have a clue do you Emily?!" Alison matched the brunettes anger with her own.

"I don't have a clue? That's laughable Alison because most of the time I feel like I'm the only one of us living in the real world." Emily scoffed back.

"Well we're not in the real world right now, we're in my world and there are different rules here!", she threw her hands up in frustration, "You don't get the luxury of telling people that it's none of their business in this world, or for people not to have an opinion on every aspect of your life! They find the slightest bit of information and then they dig, Emily! They dig and dig and dig and they keep digging until you're at the bottom of that hole staring up at them, unable to move, unable to call out or help yourself in anyway! Then when you're incapacitated at the bottom of that hole, with the people who were supposed to help you, care about and love you staring down at you, that's when they begin to fill it in. With you still down there and they don't care whether you survive or not, it's all about self preservation at that point. They only look out for themselves!"

"Yeah, I get that Ali, I do." Emily's voice was softer now, she climbed out of bed and slowly wiped away the tear that Alison didn't even realise had begun to make its way down her face, "But I'll be there to pull you back out of the hole, I won't leave you down there."

Sweet Emily, always trying to save her. What she didn't seem to realise was that she wouldn't be able to reach down to pull her out, because they would bury her too.

"We have a meeting, we'll talk about it later." Alison turned and continued out of the room.

"Yeah later, just like always, but later never comes does it Alison." She heard Emily mutter after her.

Alison bristled at the use of her full name, but carried on. She had been all for taking that step a week ago, but the situation she had just found herself in suddenly made the reality seem far too daunting. She was more torn than she'd ever been. It wasn't like she'd never been attacked by the press before. She had a bigger understanding of it than Emily would ever know. After the Rollins debacle it had gotten so bad that she'd ended up escaping to France with her "friend" CeCe for months. That was until a story broke that revealed that her supposed friend had actually been sleeping with Rollins for the majority of their relationship behind Alison's back. That was the start of a whole new shit storm. The entire experience had broken her completely. While the story of CeCe's betrayal turned out to be true, there were also plenty of other stories that weren't. That was the power of the press, people believed what they told them. That and if you had the slightest hint of a skeleton in your closet, they would find it. At a time when she was at her most vulnerable, the press had somehow turned her from a victim into a source of ridicule and scandal. They didn't care and they would be more than willing to do it again.

They'd gotten ready in cold silence. Alison wanted to be able to tell Emily all the right things, but she felt like right now they would all be lies. The truth was she felt like she needed more time, how much time she didn't know. All she knew was the feeling she got when she thought about the truth coming out and it wasn't a pleasant one. She knew she was being selfish, but she was the one with everything to lose here and Emily didn't seem to be as understanding of that as she once was. It made Alison angry at her.

They made their way into the building and got into the elevator to go up to her fathers office. She dared a glance at the brunette who was, as she knew she would be, looking very uncomfortable. She knew she hated elevators, a part of her wanted to take her hand and help her relax, but she knew it wasn't an option, even if they were on good terms. The doors opened and they both stepped out, still not acknowledging each other.

"Miss DiLaurentis, go right in. Miss Fields will be called through shortly." The secretary greeted them.

Taking a deep breath she opened the door and stepped into her fathers office.

"Good morning Alison," Her father greeted her, not looking up from his desk, "How are you feeling this morning?"

"I'm fine thank you," Alison always felt like a child in her fathers office, something about it made her feel small and powerless. She moved forward to take a seat in front of him, as he closed the file on his desk.

"I believe we have much to discuss." He finally looked up, his face was stern and unfriendly.

"I don't think we have that much to discuss," Alison tried to maintain a confident façade, "Fields is more that competent at her job, just renew her contract."

"And this is her being competent at her job is it?" He asked as he pushed the file toward her.

Alison took the manila folder and opened it, her breath left her body as she audibly gasped. The photographer had gotten the picture after all. There was no mistaking it was her in Emily's arms, one hand cupping her bodyguards face as she placed an open mouth kiss on her cheek. Eyes closed, Emily's face registering shock as the photo was taken.

"I got a phone call in the early hours of this morning from Dean, the picture was sold to him. I tried to use my pull with him and our years of friendship to get him to bury it, but business is business. He did me the courtesy of 24 hours to get our shit together, so how about you start talking so I can begin to do that." Her father used the same voice he used when he was disciplining an incompetent employee.

"Dad I…" Alison began, words failing her.

"No bullshit Alison, what the hell is this?!" He had completely lost his cool now.

She tried to find the words, anything at all. Her lies usually came so easily to her, she could manipulate anyone with a few well placed words, but right now as she sat in front of her father with the picture on her lap, all she could do was stare at it.

"Ok, well if you won't tell me what's going on, how about we get Miss Fields in here."

"No," Alison finally found her voice, "I can explain."

"Well I'm all ears Alison." He leaned back in his chair and gestured for her to begin.

"I was spiked, I don't even remember it happening." It wasn't a lie, "Fields told me about it this morning, you can see the shock on her face. It was a drunken, one off, over friendly gesture."

"Well if that was the case, we could spin that in your favour. Drugged at a party, being grateful to the bodyguard."

"Exactly." Alison forced a smile, relief setting in. However it was short lived.

"That's not the case though is it Alison?"

"I don't know what you mean." The uncomfortable feeling settled itself in her chest again.

"Look underneath that picture."

She moved the photograph to reveal another, Emily moving the hair out of her face as they stared at each other with affection in the park. She remembered it was just before the brunettes birthday. Underneath that another picture, this time from the charity luncheon. Alison stood looking at her mother, Emily behind her, one of Alison's hands reaching back and holding Emily's. Beneath that, a picture taken the night her stalker was apprehended. Alison with an arm wrapped around Emily's waist as she had led her to the ambulance.

"You see as individual photographs they mean nothing. The person taking them, no doubt after some dirt, probably didn't realise their significance and value until they took the one they did last night. However after last night, they painstakingly went through every shot they had and now, well now they have a story don't they." Her father had nothing but disdain and venom in his voice. "I'm assured there are even more of these little moments in the archives."

Alison could do nothing but look up in horror.

"I believed they were grasping at straws, that it was all misunderstanding, but then I went through your statements." He picked up another sheet from his desk, "You charted private jets to Rosewood, which explains where you spent thanksgiving. There are a few other discrepancies that couldn't truly prove anything, but then I discovered you'd purchased property in Rosewood too. I thought it strange, but imagine how much more strange I found it when I discovered that property to be in the name of a Miss Emily Fields."

"Listen, Dad…" Alison honestly had no idea where she was going with her sentence when she started it, but it didn't matter, she was soon cut off again.

"You've had your fun Alison, you've rebelled and experimented, but it ends now. No more, it's over. You will not shame this family. She can keep the house and I have an envelope here with a generous severance package in it. After this meeting you will not see her again."

"You can't do that." Alison found her voice, it was shaky, but she found it.

"I can and I will." His tone left no room for argument, he buzzed his secretary, "Send her through."

"She won't take the money." Alison spoke with more strength than she currently felt.

"Oh please Alison, they always do." He chucked without mirth.

Emily entered through the doors, no idea of what was in store for her inside. Alison wanted to turn and look at her, she wanted to apologise, she wanted to fight for her. However she remained glued to her chair, staring down.

"Ah, Miss Fields. Nice of you to join us." Kenneth greeted as she moved toward the desk, sensing the obvious tension in the room.

"Is there a problem?" Emily asked, still unaware of the revelations.

"There is, but not for much longer." He all but snarled at her.

"What's going on?" Emily looked at Alison for answers, she could feel her gaze burning into the side of her head, but she still couldn't bring herself to look. Instead she just held her hand out to give her the folder.

"You see, my daughter here has been foolish. The fun is over, no more meal ticket for you. Your contract will not be renewed. You can keep what you already managed to scam from this family, I will even give you a leaving bonus. After you leave this room though, you are to have no more contact with Miss DiLaurentis, do I make myself clear?" He stood up and tried to hand Emily the envelope.

"I don't want your money." Emily scoffed, refusing to take it, "I don't care about the job, don't renew my contract, but Alison is a grown woman and she can see who she wants."

"I see, you've made the mistake here of thinking that you have a choice."

"There's always a choice." The comment was aimed directly at Alison.

"Is this more serious than I've been led to believe?" Kenneth also aimed his question at Alison.

Alison swallowed hard. She wanted to say yes, she wanted to tell her father that he couldn't stop her from being with Emily.

"Because if it is, then I won't be able to step in and save you from the press. You're on your own, you'll be cut off completely. You'll have ruined your own life." He spoke quietly and angrily.

"Ruined her life?!" Emily spoke up again, "She doesn't need you, she doesn't need your money and she is more than capable of 'saving' herself!"

"So it is serious?"

"Mr DiLaurentis, I am in love with your daughter." Emily spoke with confidence.

"Is this true Alison? Are you in love with this woman?" Her father sounded beyond disgusted, "Are you going to throw your entire life away for her?"

Alison's thoughts raced around her head. She wasn't ready for this, she wasn't ready to answer these questions. It was all too much, her chest tightened, she struggled to get her breath. Her father was right, she would be throwing everything away. The press would be relentless and it wouldn't just be her they'd go after. They would tear Emily's life apart, sweet Emily, who didn't deserve any of this. They would bury her at the bottom of that hole with her.

"Ali?" Emily's soft sweet voice broke through her thoughts.

She finally looked up to meet her eyes, taking a moment to memorise every detail. The truth was she was completely in love with Emily Fields and she'd never even told her. The thought of Emily having to go through the hell that would inevitably be coming their way was too much to bear. She'd already been through it after Rollins and barely made it through. Could she do it again and make it out the other side? Could Emily? Would they go after Pam? Her friends? Inevitably, she would end up resenting Alison for it. She needed to protect them both and she only knew one way to do that. It wasn't what she wanted, but she saw no other choice. She had to lie. So she took a deep breath and took one last opportunity to drink Emily in, to run the life she had built for them in her imagination through her head one final time. It took every ounce of her strength to keep her poker face, to not let Emily see just what she meant to her. Then she opened her mouth to do what she knew she had to.

"No," She stated calmly, turning away from Emily, "It was all just a bit of fun." She could practically hear Emily's heart shatter next to her.

"Ali? What are you talking about?" Emily's voice broke as she moved to stand so that Alison had no choice but to look at her.

"I got bored and you were there, I never had any intention of having a relationship with you Emily. You were just practice for the real thing." Alison kep her voice steady, pulling on all her years as queen bee and bitch.

"You don't mean that, Ali, you're saying it to make this all go away, but it won't." Emily knelt down in front of her chair so that she was eye level, "Don't you get it, none of this matters." She gestured around the impressive office space, "What matters is this," she took Alison's hand and placed it on her chest over her heart. Alison could feel the steady beat, then she moved their hands so that they were over Alison's own heart, "and this. This won't go away Ali, the press might, but this feeling here? The one that I know you feel, that won't go anywhere."

Why couldn't she just make this easy and leave? Feeling her resolve shaking she tore her eyes from Emily's and stood up. Glancing at her father as his gaze burned into her.

"You're talking nonsense, don't touch me! I don't want to see you again!"

Emily physically recoiled at Alison's words and tone, and as much as it pained Alison know that she was causing Emily this much hurt, she knew it was for the best.

"You don't mean any of it, look me in the eye and tell me." Emily stood defiantly in front of her, "Look me straight in the eye and tell me that you don't love me too."

Pausing only to check her emotional mask didn't slip, Alison looked Emily straight in the eye and told the biggest lie she had ever told in her life, "I don't love you. I never have and I never will."

The pain in Emily's eyes was too much for her to deal with, she needed her to go, "Leave now, you're not welcome here."

"Well then it's settled, take your money and leave and we can start to clean this mess up." Kenneth finally spoke after witnessing the exchange. He held the envelope back out to Emily again.

Emily silently took the envelope and Alison was suddenly hit with an immense amount of hurt. She had no right to be angry, she had just broken the woman's heart, but she still couldn't believe she would take the payoff. Then Emily ripped the envelope in two, dropped it on the floor and wordlessly walked out of the door. Alison felt terrible for even thinking she was going to accept it. Emily was too good for that and too good for her.

"Well you were right, I'll give you that." Her father broke the empty silence.

"I'm sorry?" Alison fought to keep her voice steady, she could feel the tears coming.

"She didn't take the money, the fool." He sat back behind his desk, "Right, let's get this mess straightened out."

Alison remained silent, she didn't trust her own voice right now. It had taken everything she had to do what she did without breaking.

"Oh and Alison," Her father stared her straight in the eyes, "If you ever pull any shit like this again, I will end you myself."

Giving him no reaction at all, she sat stoically, trying to ignore the agonising pain in her chest. Repeating the phrase, 'it was the right thing to do' in her head in the hope that if she said it enough times, it might actually be true.

 **THE END**

 **Jokes, I'm working on it guys I promise. I also apologise for any errors above, I just wanted to get this out.**


	14. Chapter 14

**Well hello there, hope you're all well and life is treating you right. Not as long between chapters this time, I'm all about getting this finished! Well, in between Netflix binges and general procrastination, but yeah! Let's finish this! Thank you to the people that took the time to comment and let me know what you thought, much appreciated. Thank you also for not yelling at me too much about my unauthorised sabbatical. I apologise for any mistakes, I'm sure there are some. Actually I'm sure there are loads. So I hope it's not too horrific a read, both emotionally and just in terms of bad writing. My editor/publisher/manager/cheerleader/life coach/number 1 fan was pushing me to get it out tonight. Onward we go...**

Emily stumbled into the kitchen, opening up the fridge to grab another beer. It was the only time she left her room, at the start Hanna had tried to fight her on the constant drinking and sleeping the day away. After the first week though, she had finally let her be and the unanswered calls from Spencer and Aria had stopped also. They still sent her at least one message a day reminding her that they were there for her, but that they'd give her some space. She slammed the fridge door and turned to make her way back to her room.

"Enough is enough, Em." Hanna's stern voice came from behind.

She ignored it and continued her staggered walk back to her refuge.

"No." Hanna all but yelled, moving to stand in front of her best friend and yanking the bottle from her grip. "It's been two weeks, I've let this go on long enough. I thought you just needed some time, but this has to stop. This isn't a way to live and this isn't you."

Emily's glazed eyes stared vacantly back at her, "I don't care."

She pushed past her and stalked into her bedroom, Hanna stopping her from closing the door and entering behind her.

"I get that you're hurt, I get that, but you're acting like nobody else cares about you! Like nobody else matters! You may have lost Alison, but I've lost my best friend. So no more, tomorrow you are getting up, you are getting dressed, you are not drinking anything stronger than coffee and you are sorting your shit out!" Hanna folded her arms and stared her down.

"Yeah, sure. Whatever."

Emily had absolutely no intention of doing any of those things, but she hoped that with that answer she'd be left in peace to wallow in her constant misery.

"Not whatever, I mean it, Em!" Hanna's eyes got wet, "I miss you and I want to help you, but you won't let me."

"Ok. Fine." Emily lay down on her bed and rolled over to face the other way.

"It's not fine, you're not fine." Hanna sat down on the bed behind her, "I know you need time to process things, so I've given you that, but now it's time to talk."

"I don't want to talk." Emily was getting irritated.

"I know you don't want to, but you need to." Hanna said gently, stroking her hair.

"There's nothing to talk about, she's gone, it's over. Done. That's it." Emily felt the latest tear slide down her cheek. She was surprised she had any left.

Hanna moved so that she was the big spoon and wrapped an arm around her, "I've always been there for you. Just like you've been there for me. When my dad left, we got through it together. When you came out, we got through it together. When your dad died, we got through it together. If we can get through that, we can get through this."

Emily felt her body begin to violently shake as she let the tears flow. Hanna just held her tighter, "Tomorrow we talk, tonight we cry it out."

Emily nodded through her tears and for the first time in two weeks, she remembered what it felt like to be loved.

Hanna had held her as she sobbed herself to sleep, she never said anything, she just let Emily get it all out. When she awoke in the morning she had a pounding headache and felt completely dehydrated. Hanna was right, she couldn't go on like this. While it may have felt like her world had ended, it hadn't. There were still plenty of people in her life and she owed it to them to pull herself together and start to move on. No matter how painful that was going to be. True to her word she had talked to Hanna. Filling her in on every going on from the start, to that horrible day in her fathers office. Her best friend reacted exactly as she'd expected. There was name calling and offers to inflict pain on the parties involved, but Emily just shushed her and asked her to please not speak badly of her ex. Although she had broken her heart, Emily still didn't believe a word she had said. Maybe it was just hope that the last six months had meant something to the blonde socialite, but she had to have that hope, because the nagging feeling in the back of her mind that Alison had meant every word was too much to bear.

"Have you spoken to her at all?" Hanna breaks through her troubled thoughts.

"No, I'm not allowed. The contract is ironclad. If they say I can't, then I can't." Emily sighed.

"You're going to let a little thing like a legal document and going to prison stop you?" Hanna scoffed.

"Honestly Han, I'm done." Emily rubbed her head, as though if she rubbed hard enough the head ache might go.

"You are?" Hanna looked shocked.

Emily sighed again, "She can contact me, she hasn't. This is her mess to fix. I'm sick of being put second to everything else in her life. If she wants me, she has to be the one to come and get me. I won't go back to how it was before, it's all or nothing. So yeah, I'm done, because the chance of that happening is the same as you finishing a novel."

"Ah there's the asshole I know and love." Hanna smirked, then her face turned serious, "I…I sent her a message."

"What? When?" Emily sat up properly and stared open mouthed at her sheepish looking best friend.

"The day after it happened," Hanna looked at her sombrely, "I didn't want to message her on the first day. I hoped it was all just a misunderstanding, or one of your normal fights. By the second day though, seeing what you were like, I knew it wasn't. So I sent her a message, she didn't reply, so I got angry and sent her a pretty horrible one."

"Saying what?" Emily was a little bit pissed off at Hanna for crossing that line, but she was more curious as to what Alison may have said to her.

"What I said doesn't matter," Hanna looked like she was trying to contain her anger, "she finally messaged me back after the sixth or seventh tirade."

Emily just stared at her with questioning eyes.

"I mean I said all this horrible stuff, stuff that I thought would at least get a rise out of her, but all she sent back was 'I'm sorry'. Then she blocked my number."

"You shouldn't have done that."

"I know, but you're my best friend and Alison's supposed to be my friend too." Hanna looked sad.

"I know why you did it, but please don't get involved in this. It's not your problem." Emily softened somewhat. She knew Hanna's intentions, despite her poor execution, had been good.

"Well we can't get involved now anyway." Hanna rolled her eyes.

"We?"

"Yeah, Aria and Spence both tried to call her. See if they could help with whatever is going on, but she blocked their numbers too."

"I love you all, but no, you guys don't have to try and help anything."

"I don't know about Spencer, she was probably going to give her an earful, but Aria actually called to see if she was alright." Hanna didn't look impressed, "Apparently when it comes to friendship she has no loyalty."

Emily didn't respond, but internally she mused that while she may not be the most loyal, she certainly had the biggest heart.

"Also, I know you need time still, but you also need a pay check. I may have a job for you if you're interested?" Hanna pushed.

"Yeah, sure, tell me about it later. Do you want to go for a run?" Emily moved to drag herself out of bed, she was done with talking about this. She needed to get back to being herself.

"I would rather do anything else." Hanna pulled a face of disgust.

"Tough," Emily reached for her hand and pulled her up, "You're meant to be there for me and right now that means exercise."

"I may have preferred it when you were constantly drunk and wallowing in a pit of your own filth and misery. Let's go back to that."

"Well I mean if you're sure…" Emily pretended to ponder on it for a moment.

"Okay, okay." Hanna held her hands up in defeat, "Just give me a moment to go get ready for this living hell."

Emily smiled a genuine smile as her friend stomped out of her room. Thank god for Hanna Marin.

The run turned out to be more of a gentle jog and Emily seemed to exercise her mouth more than anything else. Her constant shouting for Hanna to get her ass moving had caused more than one head to be turned. Running gave her time to think though, something she had been avoiding doing too much over the last couple of weeks. She thought about what else she could have said in that room, she thought about whether she should have just gone along with Ali's world of lies forever. She wondered if she would have been happier living in that situation rather than the misery of being alone. Most of all though, she thought about those damn pictures. The reason it had all gone to shit. Everyday since it happened she expected her phone to ring and some reporter to be on the other end, begging her for the scoop, but it never happened. She'd never seen or heard a trace of the story. Realising that she'd been living in her bubble of booze and hate for the last fourteen days, maybe she just missed it all.

"Hey, Han?" She called out to the blonde who was still panting heavily and heading to take a shower.

"Yeah?"

"Did the pictures ever come out?" Emily tried to sound like she didn't care whether they had or hadn't, she was supposed to be moving on.

Hanna could clearly see through her fake nonchalance though, she looked at her with pity, "Not that I ever saw. Daddy's money must have worked after all."

"Good, I mean, yeah that's…whatever." Emily trailed off and pretended she needed a drink.

Hanna just stared sadly after her, "Alison's been on the gossip sites and in the magazines though."

Emily stopped and turned, "She has? Why?"

"Look I don't know whether or not I should be telling you this, but it's better you hear it from me than see it on a newsstand or some internet site." She paused and sighed, "There's a different guy every night. Models, sports stars, actors, singers…I think there was even a YouTuber…anyway, she's on a mission. Leaving clubs in the early hours with a different piece of arm candy and then just saying, 'no comment' to the paps."

Emily just nodded sadly, that wasn't Alison. She wasn't even angry at her for it, she knew she should be, but she just couldn't find the energy to be. If anything it made her feel concerned for her ex. What she was doing was either her going off the rails, or her fathers instructions. Neither made her feel any better about the situation.

"Thanks for today, Han."

"Are you ok?" Hanna tilted her head, looking at her with pity.

"No." Emily answered honestly, "but I will be."

Alison stumbled out of the club laughing. Not because she was having a good time, or had actually felt any joy at all in the last three weeks, but because there were a crowd of photographers all waiting to catch the best shot and those were her orders. Tonight's pretend love interest was an up and coming NBA player wanting to make a name for himself. Not that she could even remember his name. Her fathers secretary just sent her an email letting her know who she would be spending the evening with and a short bio. She never read anything past the name, what was the point, it wasn't like it was going to go anywhere. The men all understood the deal, a night out with her and their profile would be raised significantly. They all signed on the dotted line and everyone was happy. Everyone except her that was. When she had asked how long she would have to keep this charade up for, her father angrily told her as long as he told her to and that was that. He had struck a costly deal with the owner of the photographs that would keep them out of the press for one month, enough time for them to create their own narrative. Alison would be gaining a reputation as a party girl, young, single and having fun. No crime in that, but inevitably the press would want to bring her down. The photos would be released at the same time she was going to announce her new make up line. More specifically, the same day she was scheduled to go on a talk show to promote it. She could set the story straight right away, laugh it off and use it to gain publicity for her new business venture. Everybody wins. Everyone except her, yet again. She had no interest in bringing out a make up line, but as her father had told her, this was what was happening, end of.

"So, shall we go back to your place?" The guy, who's name she couldn't remember, whispered into her ear as they made their way to the car where Carter was waiting with her door open. She felt like it began with a J.

She ignored him as she clambered in, pretending she couldn't see her drivers disapproving stare. There was a time she would have fired him for that, but she knew she deserved it and she couldn't face losing Carter too.

"Take…him home please." She asked her driver as they set off. She'd given up on the name, it wasn't important anyway.

"Wait, I thought we had a good time?" Mr nameless said, trying to put an arm around her.

"You knew the score." Alison replied coldly as she shrugged the arm away.

He looked pissed off, but he didn't push the issue under Carters watchful eye. The drivers thoughts made clear when he didn't even get out to open the door at the mans address. Just a curt, "We've arrived."

The rest of the journey Alison could see that he wanted to say something, but he wisely chose not to. His face a picture of concern in the rear view mirror. Alison was glad when they arrived at her place, she couldn't take anymore of his disappointment.

"Let me walk you in Miss DiLaurentis." Carter said as he opened her door.

"No, don't worry. I'm fine." Alison tried to force a smile as she all but fell out of the car.

"Just up the steps." Carter took her arm before she could protest further and walked her to the door.

Once inside, she finally let the façade drop. Her whole body sagged, she greeted Pepe and made her way upstairs to bed. Slipping on the grey stained shirt and pulling the pillow out of its hiding spot in the closet, so that Martha couldn't wash it. She climbed into bed, hugged the pillow tightly and inhaled. The smell was fading and that was enough to to tip her over the edge. She unlocked her phone and went to contacts, thus her nightly ritual began. Sobbing into the pillow while her thumb hovered over Emily's name until she finally fell asleep.

When she woke up the next morning, head pounding as usual from a combination of alcohol and crying, she did her usual panicked check to make sure she hadn't actually drunk dialled Emily. Both relieved and sad to see that she hadn't. She didn't know how she even had the right to be this broken. This was her fault. It seemed like the right thing to do at the time, protect Emily at all costs. However the more she thought about it, the more she realised it hadn't been some selfless act to save Emily's privacy, it had been a completely selfish one that had backfired. Surely whatever would have come their way couldn't possibly have hurt as much as she was hurting right now. There was no going back though, how could she possibly ask Emily to give her another chance now. Not to mention the fact that despite all of these thoughts, she still couldn't stomach the idea of the story breaking and what would happen after. The fear of the Unknown, the lack of control. Alison was someone who had to have control. Not that she even had that anymore, her father was the puppet master now, he pulled the strings and she moved into whatever position he instructed. The only thing she had left at this point that was completely hers, was her writing. It turned out that having her days completely free gave her a lot of time to sit down and pump out chapter after chapter. The first book was now finished, in her head she had planned a full series, but while she was filled with inspiration for the first book, she just couldn't find any for the second. Just like her own life, her characters lives were up in the air and in turmoil with no idea what was coming next.

Her day was like any other of late, she went through the the motions, avoiding leaving the house as much as she could so she didn't have to spend time with her new security, Stone. He was one of her fathers, on loan indefinitely. It was like she was constantly being spied on, if she decided to cut out of the club before the agreed time he'd be stood there with a shake of his head. There wasn't anything she could do about it, because he didn't work for her, he was following somebody else's orders. What she said didn't matter, he knew his job was safe and he was as hard and dull as his name suggested.

Settling down at her computer, she poured herself a glass of wine. It was late afternoon she justified to herself. She opened up her emails and replied to the urgent ones, ignoring anything else. Then as it usually did after a bottle of wine, curiosity got the better of her and she opened up Facebook. She had a fake profile set up so that she could check in on whoever she wanted, whenever she wanted. Right now, that person was Hanna Marin. Typing her name in the search bar she clicked her profile to see if there was any sign of Emily on it. She knew it was stupid and juvenile, she also knew that the last twenty times she'd looked there was nothing on there anyway. Then her heart stopped. Hanna had been tagged in a post four hours ago, but Hanna wasn't in the picture that accompanied it. No, that wasn't Hanna with her arm around some bitch called Astrid's shoulders. That was Emily. Her Emily. Expect she wasn't her Emily anymore, because the post clearly read 'Can't thank Hanna Marin enough for setting me up with this wonderful woman, I know I'm not going to be able to walk tomorrow though!' Followed by a laughing face. Alison saw red, before she knew what she'd done her computer was hitting the wall at the other side of the room. Who the fuck was Astrid?! It had been three weeks! Three weeks and she was already making sure that some whore couldn't walk straight! She stormed to the kitchen and grabbed another bottle, not even bothering with the glass. She knew this was her fault, but for her to go and fuck somebody else while Alison was still falling to sleep smelling her scent on a pillow…"FUCK YOU, EMILY! FUCK YOU!" She yelled into the empty house, before collapsing on the floor and sobbing. How long she stayed like that, just laying on the floor drinking and sobbing, she didn't know, but her emotions soon turned to angry. She was Alison DiLaurentis and she deserved answers. Had Alison actually had any friends left, they would have been there for her at this dark time in her life, but she didn't. So there was nobody there to stop her from making this reckless, drunken phone call. She hit call on Emily's contact details and after a moments silence it began to ring. It rang exactly six times, before it went to voicemail. Which would have been the ideal time to hang up and pretend like this never happened. The near enough two bottles of wine that Alison had consumed though, they had a different plan.

"WHO THE FUCK IS ASTRID?! I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'D DO THIS! MOVED ON PRETTY QUICK DIDN'T YOU?! HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?! I THOUGHT YOU LOVED ME! BUT NO, NOW YOU'RE BUSY MAKING SURE SOME BITCH CAN'T WALK PROPERLY! DID I MEAN NOTHING TO YOU? WELL DON'T WORRY BECAUSE I AM SO OVER YOU! I'M FINE, I'M DOING JUST FINE WITHOUT YOU! IN FACT I WROTE A FUCKING BOOK BECAUSE I'M DOING THAT FINE! YOU KNOW WHAT? FUCK YOU, EMILY!"

She hung up the phone and stomped over to where her computer lay on the floor with a broken screen. The crack going straight through Emily's face. Then it hit her what just happened, what she'd done. While it hurt her that Emily had moved on so quickly, she had caused it. It was all on her. In no way did Emily deserve that phone call, she didn't deserve Alison storming back into her life like a bull in a china shop, just causing more pain and damage. That's all she ever seemed to do, just cause more hurt wherever she went. She had lost the one good thing that had ever happened to her. Actually, she hadn't lost anything. This wasn't carelessness on her part, she had tossed it away, destroyed it in the space of five minutes. Six months of the most blissful happiness she had ever felt, completely obliterated in less than five minutes. All because she was a coward. It was her that deserved a lifetime of misery, not Emily. If Emily had managed to piece her life back together, then Alison was just going to have to find it somewhere deep within herself to be happy for her. She couldn't even fathom where she was going to find that, but she owed it Emily. Realising that the tears had started to flow again, she wiped angrily at her face. She needed to apologise to the brunette, the alcohol was starting to lose its affect. If she was going to do this, she needed to do it while she still had the courage. She looked down at her phone again. Emily might not have even heard the voicemail yet, if she had she probably wasn't going to pick up now. Maybe she didn't want to talk to her at all anyway, there was a reason it had gone to voicemail in the first place. Maybe she was with Astrid, the thought made her blood boil with anger again. Maybe calling her again wasn't a good idea after all. No, she needed to make this right. Or as right as she could considering the fact that she had shattered the girls heart, all while staring her right in the eye. She took a deep breath as her thumb hovered above Emily's name. At this stage she had nothing left to lose, she pressed call. The phone barely rang twice before it was picked up.

"Please stop, Alison." Emily's voice answered at the other end, "I can't do this, please don't call me. This isn't fair."

Alison paused, all of her air suddenly taken away by hearing the brunettes voice after all this time. She suddenly realised just how much she had missed her and it was more she could even comprehend.

"You can't ignore me for weeks and then leave shitty, drunk voicemails like that and then call back to leave another one." Emily's voice brought her back, "You don't get to be angry, you made this decision."

"I'm sorry." Alison managed to choke out, although her voice was so quiet she wasn't sure whether or not Emily actually heard her.

"Well you should be." Emily spat back down the phone.

"I'm so, so sorry." Alison couldn't think of anything else to say as she began to cry down the phone, something she didn't want to do.

"No, Alison. You can't do this." Emily's voice shook as she spoke.

Alison fought back the tears and tried to sound as OK as she could, "I know, I just wanted to apologise for the shitty, drunk voicemail. You didn't deserve that." She took another deep breath and tried her best to sound convincing for the next part, "You've moved on and I'm happy for you, you deserve to be happy."

Emily made a noise at the other end of the line that Alison couldn't decipher. It sounded like a strangled laugh.

"You think I've moved on?" She sounded angrier than when she'd picked up the phone.

"I saw Hanna's Facebook…" Alison trailed off.

"Oh yeah, I gathered that." Emily said abruptly.

"So who is she?" Alison couldn't help but ask.

"So that's how it is? We can't be together, but I'm not allowed to be with anyone else either?"

The venom in her comment hit Alison hard, because she wanted to shout yes. She wanted to tell her that she didn't want her to be with anyone else ever, because she was hers. She was her Emily and nobody else was even allowed to look at her. Instead she tried to fight what the alcohol was telling her to do.

"I said I was happy for you." She managed to stutter out after a beat.

"Doesn't count if you don't mean it Alison." Emily could see right through her.

"And what if I didn't mean it?" The alcohol won.

"It wouldn't matter." Emily sounded like she was trying to put conviction behind her words, but something didn't ring true, "I mean you're out every night with a different fuck boy and you don't have me sending you shitty messages about it do you?"

"You know that's not what that looks like." She couldn't keep the hurt out of her voice, she knew that Emily knew it was all for show.

"Do I? How do I know that it's not exactly what the press are saying?" Emily sounded hurt too.

"Because I think you know me well enough to know that's not true."

" I used to think so too." The comment was laced with disdain.

"Yeah, well you think you know a person." Alison bit back.

"Yeah, you do." Emily just sounded defeated.

"So what I think doesn't matter to you anymore?" Alison raised the issue again.

"Well what I think has never mattered to you. You made that obvious three weeks ago."

That one stung more than Alison would like to admit, but rather than address the issue she just did what she always did and deflected.

"Well there's only one of us being publicly talked about for making it hard for people to walk the next day!" Alison's stated snarkily, she couldn't help it. No matter what she told herself, she was pissed off.

"Well yeah, it's my fucking job!" Emily matched her tone.

"Your job?! What are you a fucking hooker now?!"

"No! I'm her personal trainer!" Emily screamed back.

"Oh." It was all Alison could manage.

"You think people write shit about not being able to walk properly about people they're dating? You think I'd date someone who did write shit like that?" Emily asked as if she was stupid.

Which quite frankly, she was. Alison felt like an idiot. Of course people didn't put stuff like that on Facebook. Her jealousy had caused her to jump straight there and she didn't even for a second pause to reason.

"She works with Hanna." Emily offered up after a moments silence on both ends.

"Is she nice?" Alison didn't know why she asked that, she just needed to fill the silence.

"Seems it, but I don't really know. I only started working with her today. All I know so far is that she sings the Norwegian national anthem when she's trying to get through the pain barrier."

Against all odds of the conversation it made Alison giggle, "She does?"

"Yeah." Emily half heartedly laughed too, "It was a bit weird the first couple of times, but I'm getting used to it. I reckon I'll know all the words by next week."

"I'm sorry." Alison said again.

"Why did you call, Alison?" Emily sighed.

"Because I am," She felt the tears coming again, "and I thought you should know that I never wanted any of this to happen."

"Then why did you let it?" Emily asked, her voice sounding quiet and sad.

"It seemed like the right thing to do."

"For who?" The brunette sounded like she was crying too now.

"I don't even know anymore."

"Why are you calling, Ali?"

The use of her nickname didn't go unnoticed by the blonde, in fact it made her heart ache.

"The story is going to come out next week." She mumbled.

"What?"

"The story, about us. The pictures, they're coming out next week." Alison spoke more clearly.

"Why are you telling me this?"

"I just thought you should know. I thought you should know how it's going to go down." Alison suddenly felt a wave of embarrassment.

"I don't give a shit Alison. Do what you want, say what you want, deny what you want." She sounded angry again, "Just like you did in the office."

"Emily you know I didn't…" Alison tried to find the words, "what I said…I didn't…"

"I don't know anything." Emily replied plainly.

"Well…I didn't."

"Actions speak louder than words."

Emily was right and Alison knew that she wasn't going to like the actions she was going to take next.

"I'm going on a talk show."

"Good for you."

"I'm going to counter the claims on there."

"Goodbye, Alison."

"No!" Alison shouted down the phone, "Please don't hang up."

"You've just called me to tell me that you're going to deny the entire relationship that we had on national television. Of course I'm hanging up."

"I'm not denying the entire relationship, I'm going to say that we're friends." Alison tried to defend herself, but it sounded weak even to her.

"I am so sick and tired of your shit Ali, I can't do this."

"Oh you think the shit would have been easier to deal with if this came out and we were together?"

"I think you didn't even give me the chance to try, but yeah, I do. You know why? We would have had each other and at least it would have been true! You made the decision for both of us Ali! That wasn't fair, we should have discussed it together, we should have decided together. I shouldn't have been ambushed in that office by you and your father after you'd already made a plan!" Emily was definitely crying now.

"I know." Alison replied quietly and sadly.

"Then why did you do it?"

"Because I was trying to protect you."

"Really? Because all you did was hurt me more than I've ever been hurt before."

"I know, but once this has all blown over we could try and meet up?"

"In secret?"

"Well, yeah."

"I'm hanging up now."

"Please don't."

"Why? Give me one good reason that I shouldn't?"

"Because I wanted this to work and I wish it could have been different." Alison spoke honestly.

"Yeah, well that's not enough. You can't just want something, you have to work for it. It could have been different Ali, but you chose for it to be this way."

"Ok then, because you love me." Ali spoke through sobs.

"Well if I've learned anything from you at all, it's that sometimes love isn't enough."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means you need to start being honest with yourself, I haven't heard from you in three weeks and you only call me when you're drunk and angry. It means sort your shit out. It means I don't want somebody in my life that lies about me on talk shows. It means I don't want to meet up in secret. It means I want to be in a normal adult relationship, where people tell people when they love them and it means that this conversation is over. Goodbye, Alison. I'm happy for you that you finished the book. Believe it or not, I actually do want you to be happy."

Before Alison could respond the line went dead. She slumped down onto the floor where she stood and tried to replay the conversation in her head. It didn't go how she thought it would, but then again, maybe it did. What did she really expect? Emily to just tell her it was all ok and everything was fine? That they could go back to how things were before? What did she mean about being honest with herself? She was being honest when she said that she was sorry. Sad, angry and confused she hauled herself up to bed to begin her nightly ritual.

Emily was shaking when she got off the phone. She'd tried to stay as calm as she could throughout. While she wanted to cry and beg Alison to give them another chance, she knew no good would come of it. That had to come from the blonde. She had to be the one willing to change things. She'd missed her initial call when she was in the shower. While the voicemail had made her so angry she wanted to punch something, it still couldn't stop her from picking up the phone. Even if she'd told her to stop, a part of her wanted Ali to call her everyday. She had to stay strong and stand her ground though. She wasn't willing to go back to before and she couldn't keep living in the past. They had to move forward and they had to have a future or they had nothing. That's what she kept telling herself. That was her mantra. A part of her hoped that Alison would think about what she'd said, but the part that held that hope was getting smaller and smaller. The only thing that she did know for sure, was that in a weeks time, it would all be over for good.

 **So there we have it, chapter 14 done. Just one more to go, two reasons for that. 1. Our story is coming to an end and 2. I'm a really big fan of multiples of 5. Until next time...could be next week, could be next year, but isn't the uncertainty kinda exciting? :)**


	15. Chapter 15

**NOTE AT END**

Alison wrote her name on the chalk board, it wouldn't be long until her English class arrived for the first lesson of the day. As she finished the last letter with a flourish she heard a sudden commotion behind her. She turned to see Emily come barreling through the door, breathless with fear in her eyes.

"He's coming!" She panted out, her voice filled with stress.

Alison stood frozen in place, she tried to speak, but it was as though her vocal chords had been removed.

"Alison, he's coming!" Emily shouted this time, "Do something!"

She tried to move towards Emily, but nothing happened. She was a living statue, unable to do anything but watch.

"Please Alison! I need you to do something!"

"In there!"

She heard her father's voice before she saw him, he strode into the room with conviction, flanked by his usual set of burly henchmen.

"Ali!" Emily screamed at her with pleading eyes.

"Take her away." Her father ordered calmly.

"Please." Emily was crying now.

Two of her fathers men grabbed her by the arms and all but carried her out of the door. She wanted to shout out, to stop it, to do anything. She knew she should be doing something, but nothing happened. She just stood there, a silent witness to what was happening in front of her.

"You're such a disappointment." Her father threw over his shoulder at her as he followed them out.

Then she was alone again, the silence suddenly broken by a loud scream. It pierced her ears and the tone of pain in it hurt her heart. It took her several moments to realise that the noise was coming from her own mouth. Try as she might, she couldn't stop the noise. Just as she couldn't make a sound before, now she had no ability to stop it. She had no control over her own body. Somewhere in the distance a dog joined in, and they both howled their misery. She felt her face grow wet, assuming they were tears she moved her hand up to wipe them and met a strange sensation. It felt like a tongue. Startled awake, she jolted up to find Pepe standing on her bed, looking at her with concern.

"It was just a dream, Pepe." She said to sooth herself as much as her faithful friend. Reaching up to scratch him between the ears.

She sighed as she flopped back onto her pillow. She'd had a variation of the same dream every night this week. The setting was always different, but the outcome was always the same. She reached over to her phone to turn the alarm off, no point in trying to get back to sleep now. She had no desire to return to dreamland, nothing good ever awaited her there anymore. It didn't take a well trained psychologist to decipher the dreams that she'd been having, but she found it easier to just ignore them. She had no interest in delving into the feelings swimming around in her subconscious, it would do her no good. As if it wasn't hard enough that Emily invaded all of her waking thoughts, she now haunted all of her dreams too. They hadn't had any contact since the day she had drunk dialled her. Not that Alison didn't want to call her every day since, but after how things had been left, she didn't even know what she would say. Emily wanted something that Alison just couldn't give, there was no point in covering the same ground over and over. After today she was undoubtedly sure that the woman she once called her girlfriend was never going to speak to again anyway. With that thought she got out of bed, deciding to use the extra time she now had this morning to go over her notes for today's interview.

"Wow, awake in the morning and sober. Have I walked into an alternate universe?" Martha quipped as she entered the kitchen.

Alison looked up from her laptop and pulled a face at her.

"Is it a special occasion?" Martha continued to mock.

"Yeah, it's the day you become unemployed." Alison didn't even look up this time, she wasn't in the mood for Martha's humour today.

"Ah, so today's the day." Martha replied as she looked over Alison's shoulder to see her notes, "Have you learned your script by heart? Should I submit you for consideration to the Academy?"

Alison finally snapped, "Martha I do not need your shit today okay!"

"And I haven't needed your shit for the last twenty five years, but I've put up with it anyway." She didn't even sound upset at Alison's outburst.

"Well there's nothing stopping you retiring." Alison muttered angrily.

Martha laughed a hearty laugh and Alison looked up at her with confusion, she didn't understand the joke.

"What's so funny?" Alison asked with narrowed eyes.

Martha took a seat next to her at the table and looked at her with a serious expression, "Alison, have you ever wondered why I haven't retired yet?"

Alison just stared at her blankly, she'd always just assumed it was a combination of money and pride.

"I remember the day you were born," Martha looked off into the distance with a smile on her face, as though she was reliving the day, "Even from that first day I knew you were going to be a handful, but I wouldn't have changed anything about you. I loved you from the moment I first saw those big blue eyes of yours. Everybody did, people were just automatically drawn to you. Your mother hated it, she started competing with you from the moment you came into the world. A mother whose only emotion toward her own child was jealousy. It beggars belief, but that was the case. I never trusted her with you, your father may as well have not even acknowledged you existed. Too busy as always. Now as you know, I never had children of my own, it just wasn't in the stars for us. You were always mine in my heart though, I made a promise that I wouldn't leave your side until there was somebody in your life that actually loved you as you deserved to be loved. Somebody that would actually care for you. Your parents put a dog collar on you as soon as you were born and they just clip the leash onto it and pull you in whatever direction they want whenever it suits them, and you've always let them. That's all their children are to them, pets, play things, publicity. You can manipulate and strike fear into anyone, you learned from the best, but with them you always sit, stay and roll over. I've never understood it, but I've never been able to stop it."

She could see the tears in Martha's eyes, reaching over she took one of the housekeepers hands in her own. Martha took a breath and continued.

"Then seven months ago, everything changed. You changed. For the first time in your life you seemed genuinely happy. I watched over those months and the relief I felt, oh Alison, I can't even begin to describe it."

"Martha, please don't." Alison tried to remove her hand and get up, but the other woman's hand just gripped tighter and pulled her back down.

"You know I actually told Bob that I was going to retire in the new year? I told him, Bob, this is it. I've fulfilled that promise."

Alison felt herself welling up.

"Now I'll never tell you what to do Alison, I won't ever try to control you like they do. I just want to make sure you've truly thought about the decision you're about to make. I honestly thought it wouldn't have gone this far, that's why I haven't said anything until now. I can't bite my tongue anymore though, you don't keep sleeping with a dirty pillow if you're at peace with a decision this big."

Alison's head shot up, wide eyed.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to wash it." Martha almost chuckled, "But just answer me this, do you love her?"

"I'm the last person you should ask about love." Alison scoffed.

"Maybe, but you're the only one that can answer the question. You know Emily loves you. Maybe you've known all along and that scares you. When you're scared you tend to do terrible things, make bad decisions."

"What I did was terrible, I am terrible. That's why you can't ask me that about Emily."

"You find it so hard to be honest with yourself. I guess you don't have a lot of practice with that."

"Not really. People don't like the truth, the truth is slippery. Can't depend on it."

"Try it, just for a minute," Martha said softly, her eyes searching Alison's.

Alison could feel Martha searching her soul, looking for the answers hidden there. She sighed and closed her eyes.

"I know how I feel when she looks at me. I've never felt that with anyone before. It's like she sees who you really are. Maybe that's the scariest part. You look at her, you look at her eyes, and you want to be worth the effort. You want to be the person she sees."

She opened her eyes to see Martha beaming at her, "Right then," she got up from her chair, "I best be getting on with those floors."

"But I didn't answer your question." Alison called after her in confusion.

Martha stopped in the doorway and turned to look back at her, "But you didn't lie to me either. Seven months ago, you would have flown to Paris rather than answer that question, but I think you're making this a lot more complicated than it needs to be. It's simple, you either love her or you don't and it ain't nobody's business but the two of yours."

Alison was about to speak again, but she was interrupted by the door.

"That'll be your 'glam squad' coming to paint you and primp you ready for the circus." Martha didn't even try to keep the judgment out of her voice, "I'll go let them and their forty cases in."

Just like that, the moment was over.

The pavement pounded underneath Emily's feet as she ran. There was something about the steady rhythm that calmed her, she had always enjoyed running. It was something her and her dad used to do together whenever he was home, being outside and watching the world fly past her made her feel closer to him somehow. She checked her watch as she slowed up outside Hanna's apartment and was pleased to find she had beaten her previous record. She was back to her peak fitness, something that was going to be very important if she was going to get the new job that she wanted. Her mother had bumped into her old principal in town and he'd informed her that the position of swim coach was opening up at her old high school. She'd immediately put Emily's name forward and now she was just waiting for a call to see if she'd got an interview. She felt hopeful for the first time in a month, she finally had something to look forward to, a goal. Although she'd questioned whether she wanted to leave New York and go back to her hometown, she'd quickly come to the decision that there was nothing left for her in the city anymore. She couldn't walk past a building without finding some kind of memory of Alison hidden in its walls, she needed to move on, move forward. It was her dream job, in the town that she knew and loved. She'd be closer to her mother and it wasn't like her friends didn't travel to visit each other anyway. She'd spent enough time wishing and hoping that Alison was going to come through and be the person she wanted her to be. It was time to start living again.

"Em, is that you?" She heard Hanna shout from the living room as she entered the apartment.

She didn't have chance to reply before Hanna came into view, "So?"

"So?" Emily questioned back.

"Have they called you yet to tell you that you've got it?" Hanna stated as though it was obvious what she was asking before.

"No, I haven't heard from them yet," she shook her head and went into the kitchen to grab a bottle of water, "and if they do call it'll just be to say I've got an interview. They're not just going to give me it."

"Bullshit," Hanna scoffed as she followed her in, "You're the star swimmer of Rosewood, of course they'll give you it. That's probably why you haven't heard anything yet, they're probably still too busy jumping for joy that you've applied."

"Oh yeah," Emily rolled her eyes, "that's the reason."

"I'm telling you, it's in the bag. I'm that confident I've already got a bottle of prosecco chilling."

"No champagne?" Emily feigned hurt.

"I'm happy for you, but I'm not made of money." Hanna stuck her tongue out as she left the room.

Emily got her phone out again to check she hadn't missed any calls, nothing. Sighing, she decided it had been too long and she probably wasn't even going to hear anything. Better to be cautious than disappointed. God knows, optimism had fucked her over thus far.

Alison was made up and ready to go. If only they'd just let her go and get it over with, but the press coach that her father had hired to prep her for the interview wanted to go over everything one final time. Her father had basically given her a script, which she was told in no uncertain terms she should digress from. It had been drilled into her that these were all the right things to say and as long as she did as she was told, everything would be fine.

"So, what's the first thing you're going to do when they raise the issue?"

This was the third time he'd asked her that question and every time Alison got more and more irritated that Emily didn't even have a name anymore. She was just 'the issue'.

"Laugh." She replied, with no emotion. She'd decided that if she was going to make it though this, then emotionless was going to be the way forward.

"Can you demonstrate?" He leaned forward putting his elbows on his knees, she could see he was getting annoyed with her.

"No." Was all she gave him back, not backing down from his gaze and giving him one of her patented stares.

"We need to make sure that it's right." He rubbed his temples and averted his eyes, which Alison saw as a victory.

"Well unless I receive a brain injury on the way, I'm pretty sure I remember how to laugh."

"It can't just be any laugh, it has to be the right laugh." He tried to stress his point.

"Ha. Ha. Ha."

"Okay, let's just move on shall we." He cleared his throat nervously, "Now they're going to ask…"

"I know what they're going to ask!" Alison snapped, "We've been over it a million times, so let's just go, so they can actually ask me!"

"Is everything alright in here?" Martha asked as she stepped through the door. Alison had suspected she was on the other side listening intently.

"Everything is fine, thank you." The press coach's voice sounded anything but, as he waved Martha away.

"I wasn't asking you." She dismissed him with a wave of her own hand and looked directly at Alison.

"Everything is fine." Alison repeated, though it sounded compelling to everyone else, she knew that Martha wasn't convinced.

"That's a hell of a crystal ball you've been staring into if it's giving you all the questions and answers." Martha turned her attention to the press coach.

"Well," He cleared his throat, clearly not enjoying Martha's scrutinising gaze, "we've sent the approved questions ahead of time so Alison won't be blindsided. There's really no need to worry about her."

"If only somebody would." Martha muttered as she turned back to Alison, "It's never too late."

Alison just replied with a tight lipped smile.

"Shout me if you need me." She said as she went to leave the room again.

"I doubt that will be necessary." The increasingly frustrated man replied.

"I don't know why the hell you keep thinking I'm talking to you." Martha shot over her shoulder as she left.

"Are you sure you don't want to take a look at the photos, so you know what you're going to be faced with?" He reached into a folder on his lap.

"Look, I'm ready. Can we just go?" Alison asked as she stood up, it wasn't really a question. She was done, she needed to get this over with. If he made any protests as she left the room, she didn't hear them.

"Carter is ready and waiting outside for you whenever you're wanting to leave." Martha was right outside the door where Alison had assumed she had been, "He's got that great big oaf with him."

Alison just nodded. This was it, this was moment she'd been dreading for a month. In a couple of minutes she would be on her way to seal her fate. She was interrupted from her anxious thoughts by the buzz of her phone. It was a message from her mother, and she felt her eyes get wet the moment she took in the words.

Martha noticed immediately, "Alison dear, what's wrong?"

Alison just shook her head and took a deep breath, this wasn't worth having to have her make up redone. Refusing that as an answer Martha just took the phone out of her hand and read the message herself.

"Don't fuck it up xoxo" She read out loud and then handed the phone back to Alison with a chuckle, "Well look at that, me and your mother finally agree on something."

It almost made Alison laugh, but there was no humour in any part of the situation she had found herself in.

"I've spoken to Carter and told him, you just have to say the word and he…"

Alison interrupted her, "I'll see you tomorrow, Martha."

She didn't need her making her second guess her decision right now, emotionless, that was how it had to be.

She opened the door and saw Carter stood with her door open, Stone beside him with a hard look on his face. Taking a breath she descended the stairs, it seemed to take so much longer than usual. Carter nodded to her as she reached him, a sad look in his eyes.

"The word, Carter!" Martha shouted out to him from the top step.

He just nodded back at her.

"What's the word?" Stone asked Carter with authority.

"The bird is the word." Martha smiled as she stuck her middle finger up at him, before soundly slamming the door.

She heard Carter laugh quietly to himself as he shut the car door after her and Alison felt immense affection for both of them.

As the car pulled away to deliver her to her dreaded destination, she allowed herself to get lost in her own thoughts. Turning to look at the empty seat beside her, remembering how much better she had felt on the days that Emily was sat in it. How much more enjoyable her journeys had been when the funny brunette was sat there laughing and cracking jokes, usually at her expense. She shook her head as if to remove the memories and looked ahead. Carter and Stone were sat in silence in the front. Catching Carter's eyes watching her in the mirror, she was taken back to the night that she had finally called Emily her girlfriend. The night where, as Carter put it, she had finally given her patronus a chance. It had been one of the best nights of her life. All of her happiest memories included Emily in some way. Deciding to stare out of the window in the hope that watching the world go by would distract her instead, she was confused to see that they weren't where she thought they would be. She furrowed her brow as they passed the place she had gone for brunch with Emily and her friends. Their friends, that's what they had been. She'd finally had friends. Not followers, not subscribers, not fans, but actual friends. She realised at once what diversion Carter had taken them on, subtlety apparently wasn't his strong point, he slowed the car as they drove past the apartment that Emily shared with Hanna. She knew he was trying to catch her eye in the mirror, waiting for any kind of indication that he should stop. She didn't give him it though, she just plastered a look of indifference to her face and avoided his watchful eyes. If Stone was aware that they'd taken a detour, he didn't show it. Realising that Alison wasn't going to tell him to pull over, Carter sped up again and sighed. She admired both his and Martha's efforts, but it was too late to stop it now. This was the best thing for everyone. She could get back to the life she was meant to have and Emily could get on with hers. She deserved more than Alison could ever give her.

Emily put her face up the stream of water, trying to relax and let the stress leave her body. She used to love her time in the shower, it gave her time to think and unwind. However thinking wasn't something she enjoyed doing at the moment, in fact it had become a dangerous pastime. Her thoughts would always inevitably lead to Alison and that was never a good thing at the moment. Right on cue the blonde popped into her head, as did the memories that they had shared in the shower together. She groaned, maybe she should look into that eternal sunshine movie thing. Life would certainly be easier, she was pretty sure they'd never bump into each other again, it's not as though they had the same social circles. There was a loud bang and she nearly slipped as she spun toward it, seeing Hanna barreling through the door.

"Answer it!" She screamed, while jumping up and down and thrusting Emily's phone in the direction of the shower.

Emily responded with a look that, she could only presume, was usually described as a deer in headlights.

"You can unlock it from the outside." She responded to Emily's current look of bewilderment, "Now answer the damn phone, it's them!" Hanna continued the thrusting.

Emily tried to quickly gather herself, turning off the water and stepping out to take the phone. She took a breath and answered.

"Hello?"

Hanna squealed and clapped her hands, earning her a pointed look.

"Yes, this is she."

"Yeah it is!" Hanna all but shouted.

"I'm sorry, just a moment." Emily removed the phone from her ear and put her hand over the speaker, "Can you not?"

Hanna motioned as though she was zipping her mouth shut and stood solemnly.

"Thanks."

She received a thumbs up, as she put the phone back to her ear.

"Sorry about that…yes…yes…I understand."

She could see Hanna's frustration at only being able to hear one side of the conversation.

"I appreciate that. Thank you for calling…no, thank you…you have a good day too, bye."

She hung up the phone and Hanna practically burst, "Well?!"

"I got it." She smiled at her best friend.

"You got it?!"

"I got it!" Emily couldn't help the smile that had spread across her face.

"You got it!" Hanna flung herself at Emily and hugged her with all her might.

"I appreciate the enthusiasm, but how about we save this part until I'm less wet and not naked?" Emily laughed.

"Good plan." Hanna pulled away and whooped as she left the bathroom, before running back in and hugging Emily again.

"Still wet and naked."

"I don't care, I'm just really happy for you." The giddy blonde let her go and skipped out of the door again.

Things were finally looking up, Emily sighed and grinned. Wrapping a towel around herself and heading to her room. She dried off and threw on some clean clothes, before going to the living room.

"Celebration time!" Hanna sang, with a bottle of prosecco and two glasses in hand, running over to hug her again.

"OK, but let's not overdo it." Emily wasn't sure she could deal with a hangover while packing her life up.

"You're right, I'll boil the kettle and we can drink tea and have a knitting party instead. That's how most people celebrate right?" She replied as she pulled away, that stupid Hanna grin plastered on her lovable face.

"I'm going to miss you so much." Emily got a wave of emotion as it sank in that she would be leaving, she couldn't help the tears that came.

"Nope, you put them tears away missy." Hanna chastised as she turned away to pour them both a glass, she turned back to hand Emily hers and she saw that she was crying now too, "But you better."

"To new beginnings and missing each other." Emily raised her glass.

"I'll drink to that." Hanna smiled as they clinked glasses and drank, "So when do you leave?"

"Well they want me to start Monday, so I suppose I should have left yesterday. God knows how I'm going to move all my stuff and get sorted in time."

"Well at least you don't have to worry about where you're going to live." Hanna shrugged.

"I know, I'm not sure I really want to move back in with my mom long term though." It wasn't that she didn't love spending time with her, but she could be a little overbearing to live with. She also knew that she'd make her talk about the whole Alison thing and she just wanted to move past it.

"I didn't mean with your mom, you have a house remember? I mean for all her faults and how it ended, you've got to appreciate that. Most people walk away with a t shirt and couple of mix tapes at best…"

Emily just stared at her.

"Too soon?"

"Little bit, yeah."

"My bad." Hanna averted her eyes and sipped her drink.

The show was prerecorded, so while it wouldn't be broadcast until much later that night, the filming took place in the afternoon. As such, Alison wasn't at all surprised to find crowds of people outside the studio, all hoping for a selfie or an autograph. While she would usually spend a little bit of time giving a few lucky people what they wanted, today she had no inclination or energy to want to. Being Alison DiLaurentis could be exhausting at the best of times, but today she thought it might actually break her.

"Let's go." Stone stated assertively from the front of the car.

"I just need a minute." Alison replied, she was feeling incredibly overwhelmed. She dealt with bigger crowds than this frequently and it wasn't as though she'd never been interviewed before, but today for some reason she felt anxiety about it that she'd never felt before. A nagging voice in her head told her she knew exactly why she felt that way, but she shut it up before the thought could gain traction.

"We don't have time, it already took us longer to get here than I thought it would." He replied in a tone that suggested he was in charge.

"She said she needed a minute and unless you've forgotten, she's the boss. So if she says she needs a minute she gets it. If she says she needs an hour, she gets it. If she asks me to drive away now, well, I'm sure you're catching on."

Alison had never heard Carter speak so firmly. She looked up to find the two men staring at each other intently, it didn't look like either one was going to back down. Knowing that she had to get out of the car at some point and that if she sat there any longer she might not even manage that, she decided to quickly diffuse the mounting tension.

"No it's fine, lets get this over with. Don't want to keep them waiting." She attempted a smile, but she couldn't quite manage to accomplish it.

It was like neither of the men had heard her though, they stayed locked in their silent battle.

"Well I suppose I'll just be letting myself out then." She snapped, moving to open her door.

This finally got their attention, as they turned away from each other to exit the vehicle. Carter opened her door moments later, she took a deep breath and stepped out, being greeted by shouts and screams. Flashes were going off in every direction, but she just calmly put her sunglasses on and ignored every single one of them. She detached herself from the entire situation. She used to enjoy the attention, the adoring fans, the feeling of being worshiped by these strangers. Today she felt nothing, it meant nothing. So instead of revelling in her own importance like she usually would, she just silently followed Stone to the entrance. She barely even acknowledged the angry protests of the autograph and selfie hunters that she bypassed along the way. The shouts from members of the press asking about the photographs that had been released that morning fell on deaf ears.

Once they'd entered the building she was immediately swarmed by the shows staff, they didn't have long until they needed to start the taping and she was quickly ushered through to a dressing room and told someone would come to get her shortly.

"You can wait outside." She said to Stone, who was hovering like an angry wasp.

"My orders are not to take my eyes off you." He replied, making himself comfortable on the couch.

"Are you planning on sitting next to me for the interview too?" She scoffed.

"No, I can watch it from here, they have a live feed to the screen over there." He pointed while leaning back and putting his feet up on the coffee table in front of him, "I'm just going to grab some popcorn and sit back and enjoy the show." He had a smug look on his face, he knew he was privy to what was really going on and he was clearly loving every minute of it.

Alison could feel the anger bubbling up inside of her, she walked over to the other side of the room and poured herself a glass of water. She was taking a sip when a runner came in.

"Your introduction is about to start if you're ready." She spoke with a voice laced with nerves.

"No I'm not fucking ready." Alison snapped at her, "I need a drink, but this goddam water is warm and tastes like shit!"

"I..I'm sorry Miss DiLaurentis." The young woman was clearly taken off guard.

"So you should be, this is meant to be a reputable show and you're giving your guests warm dirty water?" She was looking at the runner with contempt, hands on her hips in her dominating power stance.

Taken aback and struggling to know what to say the runner looked to Stone as if for some kind of help or support, but he just smirked, obviously enjoying the return of the old Alison.

"What the fuck are you looking at him for? Are you always this incompetent? Do you treat all of your guests with this level of disrespect?"

The woman was visibly shaking now and looked like she might cry.

"You'll be lucky if you still have a job after today." Alison pushed past her and headed toward the studio.

Her heart was racing as she left the dressing room, anxiety had gripped her and she felt intense anger. She paused and leaned against the wall a moment, shutting her eyes and taking a breath. She needed to get it together, she needed to be okay on that stage. As she calmed down she felt the guilt kick in, she had absolutely no right to treat the runner that way. The way she spoke to her was out of order, she needed to go back and apologise. In her mind, she saw Emily's brown eyes looking at her in disappointment. That silent look she gave when she wanted Alison to know that what she'd done wasn't alright. She was Alison's moral compass when her own failed her, which was often. She opened her eyes and shook her head. She had behaved like the old Alison, but one thing was certain. The old Alison wouldn't have given that runner a second thought.

"Are you ready?"

One of the shows producers was peering round the corner at her with a look of trepidation.

Doing her best to remove Emily's watchful eyes from her thoughts, she just nodded her head and gave her best fake smile. She moved toward the stage and listened as the host introduced her to the audience.

"Ladies and gentlemen, my next guest is American royalty. Her family probably own this building! She's the star of page 6, the Queen of Instagram and and an education activist to boot! As if that wasn't enough, she's joining us tonight to tell us all about her new venture. The envy of millions, I know I want to be her, give it up for Alison DiLaurentis!"

The audience immediately started applauding and she was given the thumbs up by the producer to walk out. Plastering the fake smile back on she stepped out, waving at the audience as she walked to greet the host. Internally rolling her eyes at how her father could turn one speech at a benefit into her being an "education activist". There were the usual fake hugs and kisses on both cheeks and then she was sat in an armchair and he was behind his desk.

"Alison, can I call you Alison?" The host began his charming idiot routine.

"Of course, Jimmy." The act began.

"Alison, it's great to have you here. It's your first time here."

"Yes, so nice to finally meet you after watching you on TV for so long." All part of the script, she's just like everyone else, she watches television too.

"Actually we've met before! Haha!"

"We have?"

Insert the fake confusion and cue the funny anecdote, it was all going to plan. She was being everything she had been told to be, the audience were laughing in all the right places.

"So I know you're here tonight to talk about your exciting new business venture."

"That's right."

Here it came, this was it. She felt herself physically brace and prayed that it wouldn't be visible to anyone watching.

"But, err, well..haha..some interesting photographs have been making the rounds this morning and I just feel like I've got to ask you about them."

"Please, ask away." Pleasant smile, look of amusement. On the inside she looked anything but smiley and amused.

"Well as I understand it, this is your security, well former security. I've been informed she doesn't actually work for you anymore…"

His voice disappeared into nothingness as the first picture appeared on the monitor. She had been prepared for the photograph that had been taken on New Years in the elevator. When she had been asked if she'd wanted to see the pictures, she had declined. She knew what she had to say, there was no point in dredging up old memories. That photograph had ruined everything and she had no desire to see it again unless she had no choice. She was now regretting that decision though, because the picture that was currently on the screen was not one she had actually seen before, as such, it had taken her completely off guard. She wanted to take her eyes away from it, but she couldn't. It must have been taken on one of the many walks to the dog park with Pepe. She had to give credit to the photographer, because neither one of them knew they were being watched. It had obviously been taken with a long lens, but the people in it and their smiles were unmistakable. As Alison stared at the image, she barely recognised herself. Had she really ever been that happy? She was glowing, the remains of a laugh on her face, one hand on Emily's shoulder, her blue eyes transfixed to brown ones. Emily's hand was at her waist, as though steadying her. She tried to work out how long ago it had been taken, but she couldn't. The only thing she was certain of when looked at that picture, was that the two people in it were not just friends. The way they looked at each, could only be described as…the photo changed. Now it was the New Year picture. She wanted to yell out for them to go back, but she caught herself. Realising that she had missed a chunk of dialogue.

"You ok there? Looked like you spaced out for a moment there."

"Sorry, it's been a really long week trying to get these products out." She had never been so grateful for her ability to lie.

"I'll bet. As I was saying, these are some interesting pictures and there's obviously been a lot of talk about them and there's a lot of theories going round, you want to fill us in?" He turned to look at her and suddenly the entire room seemed to focus in on her.

They were waiting, she had been practicing this all week. It was time to cue the laugh and poke fun at the speculation. They were friends.

"Haha!" She nailed the laugh, "There's nothing really to explain, it's simple…"

Then her words were caught in her throat. She knew what she was supposed to say. She was supposed to tell them that when you work with somebody so closely for so long that friendships are formed. That they were just friends, they got on well and that she was sad when she moved on professionally, but that she wished her all the best and that they were still in touch. She knew that's what she was supposed to say, but it wouldn't come. Martha's words rang in her head instead. It's simple. The photograph was still stuck in her head. Those smiles, that look. She had been so happy in that picture, the kind of happy that people write about or turn into films. She couldn't remember what it felt like to be that happy, or be happy at all. The truth was she was miserable. The truth was, none of this mattered. None of these people mattered, the life that she had so desperately tried to cling onto, the money, the parties, the status. None of it actually mattered, because none of it made her happy. What was the point in any of it? She had made the decisions she had made to save her from difficulty and misery, but that's all she had now anyway. It was simple, she could throw it all away or she could fight for it.

"You were saying?" The host pressed, confused at her abrupt stop.

"It's simple…," she began again and for the first time she could remember, as she looked at the picture that was now ingrained in her mind, it really was.

"Yes.." He prompted once more.

"Yes, it's simple. It's none of your business."

The host was visibly shocked, this was not how this was meant to go. There was some nervous laughter from the audience.

"It's none of your business." She repeated again, before turning and pointing at the audience, "It's not their business either."

"I…haha…errm." He desperately looked to his producer, but Alison was standing up now.

"It's not your business, it's not their business, it's my business. Oh, and Emily's business. It isn't the business of the people that took these pictures, it isn't my fathers business, it most definitely isn't my mothers business. It's our business, nobody else's."

She was pacing the stage now gesturing wildly and the host didn't have a clue how to react, this was not the interview that he'd signed up for. The audience were shocked into silence.

"Actually, you know what?" Alison paused and spun on her heel to look at him again.

"What?" He asked tentatively.

"It's our business and our friends business. They can be involved, because they care, but you know who's business it's not?" She didn't even wait for a reply, "Stone, it's none of his fucking business. It can be Martha's business and Carter's business, I don't even mind talking to my brother about it, but that's it. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to leave because I have somewhere I need to be and as much as I'm sure you all think I fucked this interview up there's something that I fucked up much more severely that I need to try and fix."

With that she went to walk off stage, unclipping her microphone pack as she went. She stopped just as she reached the exit.

"Oh and Pam."

"Who's Pam?!" The host exasperatedly asked nobody as she exited, before putting his head on his desk.

Just as she expected Stone was striding towards her as she came off stage.

"What the hell was that?!" She could feel the anger radiating off him.

"I suggest you spruce up that resume of yours." She smirked at him as she went to storm past.

She was stopped by his hand around the top of her arm. He gripped tightly enough that it hurt her.

"Listen to me you spoilt bitch…" He was practically frothing at the mouth.

"Take your hands off her right now."

Carter looked like he was about to punch the larger man, she wasn't sure that Carter would last long in a fight with the security man, but Stone let go.

"What are you doing in here?" She asked the driver.

"Thought you might need a friendly face when you came off." He answered, still glaring at Stone who was now furiously tapping his phone.

"Well, I'm saying the word, Carter."

"Very good, Miss DiLaurentis." He held an arm out, gesturing down the hall, still never taking his eyes off Stone, "After you."

"Thank you, Carter."

He guided her though the crowd outside and they quickly made it to the car and pulled away.

"Where to, Miss DiLaurentis?" Carter asked, staring straight ahead at the road.

"Really?"

He chuckled, "Just wanted to make sure."

Alison suddenly took pause, what if this was a terrible idea. What if this was just her being selfish all over again. She couldn't just turn up on Emily's doorstep and expect all to be forgiven. She had put her through hell and after that interview, she had no doubt that the poor girl was going to be hounded by every photographer in New York.

"Carter, is this an absolutely terrible idea?"

"Well, I can't say how it will go, but I'd say it's the best one you've had in a long time." He smiled at her in the mirror.

"What if…"

"She won't." He interrupted.

"But what if…"

"Then you fight for her." He interrupted again as her phone began to ring.

She knew who it was going to be before she even look at the caller ID. She had assumed that was who Stone was contacting.

"Hello father."

It was impossible to understand exactly what he was saying, it just seemed like a lot of noise.

"Look, I've no idea what you're saying, but I can hazard a guess. So here's the thing, cut me off Dad, I don't care. I quit, I'm done. Do what you want, say what you want, I don't need you."

She hung up and felt like the world already seemed a little brighter.

"So what's the plan?" Carter asked, like the call had never happened.

"I'm going to fight for her."

Carter nodded with approval.

"How long until we're there?"

"Half an hour?"

"Can you hit the Bluetooth button so I can connect to the speakers please?"

Despite Hanna's protests, Emily had only had one glass to celebrate and then insisted that she start packing. So they were now in Emily's room surrounded by a tornado of her belongings.

"I don't know how I'm going to get all this done by tonight." Emily growled, getting irritated by the sheer amount of crap she had accumulated.

"Beats me." Hanna shrugged from her bed, pouring herself yet another glass.

"You know this might actually go quicker if you helped." Emily stated, looking up at her from her spot on the floor.

"I am helping."

"How? How are you helping right now?" Emily threw her hands up.

"One less thing for you to pack." Hanna smiled, waving the nearly empty bottle in her direction, "Caleb can help when he gets home and I'll order us some take out. See I can be helpful."

Emily just rolled her eyes as Hanna picked up her phone and continued to be unhelpful.

"You could at least pretend to be helping, I mean I'm leaving tomorrow and look at all this stuff…"

"Holy fuck." Hanna cut her off.

"I know, it's crazy. How have I managed to end up with so much stuff?"

"No, Twitter is exploding." Hanna said, never taking her eyes off her phone.

"How is that relevant right now?" Emily decided this would be easier without Hanna.

"Alison."

"What?" That got Emily's attention.

"She had that interview today, right?" Hanna was still scrolling on her phone.

"Right." Emily got up now and went to join Hanna on the bed.

"Well apparently she had a total meltdown. People who were at the recording are saying she just started yelling and walked out of the interview." Hanna finally looked at Emily, wide eyed.

"Yelling about what?" Emily stood up again, she suddenly didn't know what to do with herself.

"I don't know, it only happened like twenty minutes ago or something. People are just saying she's gone batshit."

"I…I have to go." Emily grabbed her jacket off the door and went to find her shoes.

"Go where?" Hanna shouted, chasing after her.

"To Alison." Emily replied, pulling her shoes on.

"You don't even know where she is."

"Well I'll go to her house."

"What if she's not there?"

"Then…I don't know, I'll work it out. I'll call her."

"You're not allowed, you'll be in breach of the contract."

"FUCK THE CONTRACT HANNA!" Emily shouted at a shocked looking Hanna, "I'm sorry, I just…I need to make sure she's alright."

"I understand." Hanna said with a soft smile, "Just be careful."

Emily was already out of the door.

She flung open the door to the building entrance and stepped out onto the street. First decision, should she get a cab or just run. Should she be going at all? She had far too much to do and not enough time as it was. She didn't even know what this meltdown was about, would Ali even want to see her? Deciding that she didn't care, that the need to check she was ok was more important, she chose to run it. She was about to break into a sprint when something stopped her. It was a familiar song, one that set her heart racing after her last birthday. She looked around to see where it was coming from, she couldn't tell but it was getting louder. Then a familiar black town car came into view with music blaring out of the rolled down windows.

As the car turned onto Emily's street, Alison had a terrible thought. What if she wasn't even in? She had been tempted to call ahead, but she was worried that either Emily wouldn't answer, or that she would tell her not to come. Grand gestures were all about the unexpected, so she had decided to just go for it. She needn't have worried about the brunette not being home though, because there stood outside her building was the best view Alison could have hoped for.

As the car rolled to a stop, she quickly opened the door and jumped out before she could lose her nerve. To say Emily looked surprised was an understatement.

"I know it's not quite holding a boom box outside your window, but…" Alison smiled shyly, as her brain anxiously tried to tell her all the reasons she shouldn't be doing this.

Emily just continued to stare at her blankly.

"I…" She went to speak again, but then Emily found her voice.

"I heard you turned into a crazy person today."

"Me?" Alison smiled, knowing that her outburst must already be all over the Internet.

"I was about to come find you, I was scared you'd torn somebody's head off."

"Well they kind of deserved it, but no, not crazy. I think I might actually be the sanest I've ever been." She couldn't help but laugh to herself.

"I don't know why I thought I had to come and protect you." Emily cocked her head at Alison's happy demeanor.

"You've always protected me, Em." Alison said with complete seriousness, "Ever since I met you I knew I could count on you."

Emily remained rooted to the spot, still looking confused, "So why did you push me away?"

Alison took a step closer to her, "I don't know, but I'm ready to stop."

Emily made no move, so Alison continued walking until she was stood directly in front of her.

"I want to do this." Her eyes never left the soulful brown ones that made her feel so safe.

"What do you mean?" She could see the hope in Emily's eyes and the apprehension that quickly followed.

Just then, the first of the paparazzi arrived. Cameras flashed and they were surrounded in a matter of moments. Alison had been almost certain this would happen. Emily's eyes darted around at the group that had gathered, but Alison never took her eyes off Emily.

"I think we should…" Emily finally moved, trying to guide Alison into the building.

"No," Alison stopped her, "I don't care."

Emily looked even more confused than she had before, "Alison…"

"Over the years I've been in so many failed relationships and then I met you. For the first time in my life I felt true happiness, but I screwed it up. I made excuses as to why it wouldn't work and I even believed some of them, but I was scared and I was wrong. This is the only thing in my life that I know will work and I know the reason why."

They both just stared at each other for a moment, it was like the circus around them had disappeared.

Alison swallowed hard, it was now or never, "Martha tried to get me to say it, but I didn't want to say it to her…"

Emily dipped her head closer to Alison's, "What did Martha…"

"I love you."

There, she'd said it. It was out there and it was the most honest thing she'd ever said.

Emily just stared back at her in shock.

"You told me I needed to start being honest with myself and sort my shit out. You said you want a relationship where people tell people when they love them." She was feeling more vulnerable than she'd ever felt before in her life, hating that she couldn't read Emily's face.

"I'm moving back to Rosewood. I got a job as the swim coach." Emily spluttered out.

"Ok." Alison replied, knowing that her life was about to change completely.

"I'll tell them I can't take it though." Emily tripped over her words, "I can call them…"

"No, you have to take that job. It's your dream job." Alison said firmly, she didn't want Emily ever having to give up anything else for her. From now on it was her turn to make the sacrifices and she'd do it willingly as long as Emily would have her.

"No, Ali. I'm not about to move away from you now." Emily replied incredulously.

"No. I meant, ok, we'll move to Rosewood." Ali smiled shyly up at her.

"Are you sure?" Emily was back to being shocked.

"I love you." Was all Ali said in reply, because it was all the explanation she needed to give and quite frankly, she enjoyed saying it.

"I love you too." Emily grinned before her lips found Alison's.

Ali could vaguely hear the whoops and hollers of the assembled press, but she didn't care. She finally felt like she was home again, safe and secure. Why had she wasted all that time when she could have been feeling like this?

It was the angry voice of Hanna Marin that broke them from their embrace.

"ARE YOU TWO SHITTING ME?"

They broke apart to see Hanna stood at the door with her hands on her hips.

"You couldn't have done this inside? No front row ticket for Hanna, no. Hanna has to find out about what's happening in front of her own apartment, with two of her best friends from strangers on Twitter!"

"Hey." Ali waved timidly at the irate blonde, the last time she had heard from her hadn't exactly been the friendliest.

"Get you asses inside!" She yelled like an angry mother, ushering them in, "Hanna Marin Designs, look me up!" She smiled sweetly at the crowd, before slamming the door.

A lot had happened in the fifteen years since Hanna Marin had slammed that door. As Alison sat in front of her laptop putting the finishing touches to the final book in her series, she pondered a moment on just how different her life was since she'd written the first one. The only famous person in this house was Vivian Darkbloom and nobody even knew that she lived there.

Those first few months had been difficult, it had been a whirlwind move. The press had obviously taken an interest in the major development in her life. Surprisingly though, they'd been incredibly supportive and the hate she was expecting to receive was limited to some internet trolls. A problem easily fixed by deleting her profiles and creating new private ones. The press that had followed soon left, as the close-knit community closed ranks on them and before long they had been forgotten about as they moved on to the next hot thing. It was a novel thing, living with almost total anonymity. She had quickly embraced it and the feeling of being able to walk down the street without people looking twice. If they did stop her, it was to chat about everyday things. There was still the occasional "journalist" looking for a payday, but slowly even they petered out until she just appeared now and then on Buzzfeed, "Where are they now?" lists. Her old life seemed a world away, some days it felt like she'd never lived it at all. While they still kept in touch with Martha and Carter, making the effort to visit each other, updates on everybody else from her past usually came in the form of things she read on websites or in magazines. It was how she'd learned of her father's corporate fraud charges and her parents subsequent divorce. To the best of her knowledge he was still serving time in a federal prison and she had no idea where her mother might be. Her relationship with Jason had grown stronger since they were both out of their parents shadows and she finally felt like she had a big brother. Mona had quickly taken her place as the top society girl, but the pressure was evidently too much, last she heard she was in rehab for "exhaustion".

"Mama?"

She spun in her chair to see Lily stood in her office doorway. While parenting twin girls had never been an easy task, it had become infinitely harder since they'd become teenagers. She didn't remember having this many hormones, but she wouldn't change having her mini Emily's for the world.

"Mom says that breakfast is ready."

Thrilled that the thirteen year old stood in her doorway wasn't doing so because of drama with her sister, she smiled.

"I'll be there in a sec."

Emily was usually in charge of breakfast. The first reason being that she was usually up first for her early morning run, the second was that Alison still didn't trust her wife to make dinner without burning the house down or poisoning the family.

"Did you tell her?" Emily asked Lily as she appeared back in the kitchen.

"Yup, she says she'll be here in a sec." Lily answered, sitting down at the table and opening up a textbook.

"Why are you doing your homework the morning it's due?" Alison questioned Lily, walking over to Emily and kissing her good morning.

"Can't you just say good morning like normal parents?" Grace screwed up her face from the other side of the table as she perfected her mascara, "Anyway Lils is a loser, I'm pretty sure that's not today's homework."

"Yeah, I'm just getting some extra reading in." Lily looked up at her mothers and nodded.

"Good for you, Lils." Emily smiled.

"Thanks Mom." She returned to her book, but not before sticking her tongue out at her twin sister.

"And don't call your sister a loser, Grace. If I hear that again you'll be grounded for a month." Alison added.

"Jeez, Mama. I was just messing, I meant it in a nice way." Grace rolled her eyes.

"Well then say nice things." Alison scolded.

Emily anticipated a full argument breaking out, but Grace just nodded, obviously not wishing to be grounded. While the family lived harmoniously most of the time, Ali and Grace had a tendency to butt heads. Emily and Lily had tried to tell them it was just because they were so similar, but neither of them saw it and so now it was just a source of amusement for Emily and Lily to watch them argue with, what was effectively, themselves.

"Speaking of nice things," Emily interrupted, "As its our anniversary, me and your mama are going out tonight to celebrate. Can we trust that you can look after yourselves and the house for a few hours or do I need to get Grandma round?"

"Grandma can come over if she wants." Lily answered, not looking up from her book.

"Grace?" Ali asked.

"Yeah, you can trust us. We're not kids, but sure. Grandma can come over."

As much as they gave the outward bravado of independent teenage girls, they were still Emily's sweet little girls that loved their grandmother. It made her smile.

"Can we get take out?" Grace asked with puppy dog eyes.

"Sure, I'll leave some money on the side." Emily replied.

Just as Ali answered with, "No, there's pasta and sauce in the fridge you can heat up."

They turned to look at each other with raised eyebrows.

"Thanks Mom, you rock!" Grace grinned triumphantly.

Alison continued to look at her.

"What?" Emily shrugged, "I rock."

"Yes you do." Alison snuggled into her side, "That is not one of the reasons why though."

Emily kissed the top of her head and chuckled. It was strange when she looked back at where they were fifteen years ago and how different things were now. If you'd have told Emily she'd be celebrating her fifteenth wedding anniversary with Alison DiLaurentis and making breakfast for their two children in the same house that had caused an argument all those years ago, she never would have believed you.

"What time is your meeting?" Emily asked.

"We're meeting at The Brew at 12." Alison sighed.

"You sure you want to do this?" Emily put her hands on her wife's shoulders and pulled back so she could look at her.

"Yeah, I think so. I mean the books are hit and if somebody wants to turn them into a television show I'm flattered. I just really hope that they don't fuck it up and ruin it."

"They couldn't possibly, unless they just choose to ignore the story completely and start making it up as they go along, I think it's going to be just fine."

"Mama, you owe $10 to the jar." Lily pointed in the direction of the curse jar that sat on the countertop, still not taking her head out of the book.

"You never know," Grace spoke up with a mouth full of toast, "maybe they'll just do their own thing, create a brand new villain with a dodgy accent and fall down all their own plot holes."

"Oh my god, do you think they will?" Ali gasped at the thought.

"Of course they won't, nobody is that stupid." Emily placated her, "But you don't have to do it if you don't want."

"Well going to the meeting can't hurt, the only downside is that people might find out who Vivian Darkbloom really is once it reaches a wider audience." Ali grimaced.

"Nobody cares who you are, Mama." Lily said in a tone that Emily was pretty sure was meant to be reassuring.

"Not completely true, Tom at school showed me a picture he found of you on google the other day and while I'm now scarred for life after seeing it, lots of the guys at school care who you are." Grace said with narrowed eyes.

"Tom from the swim team?" Emily asked, not managing to hide her anger very well. Even after fifteen years, she still didn't deal with jealousy very well.

"You can't fight teenage boys sweetie." Ali touched her gently on the arm.

"True, but I can make them swim extra laps." Emily answered, before giving her a kiss goodbye, "Come on girls, time to go."

"Do you know what the plans for this weekend are yet?" Alison called after her.

"Hanna and the kids are getting in on Friday night, I think Spencer and Aria are arriving on Saturday morning. So we can just leave all the kids with their grandparents and go for a night on the town."

"Ok, have a good day ladies!" She shouted out of the front door, watching the car pull out of the drive before going back to her office.

She had plenty of time before her meeting to go over her ending one more time. She walked over to the record player, before carefully picking out the well worn sleeve and placing the record on the turntable. As the familiar strains of the song that could still make her heart race began, she sat back at the computer. Glancing over what she had written, she decided that as endings go, it wasn't half bad. She shut the laptop and leaned back in her chair. Life was pretty good.

 **So that's it, that's my little story. I can only apologise that it's taken so long to complete, I hope that it was worth it for you. To those who are disappointed, I once again apologise. This is my one and only foray into the world of fanfiction. It's been a blast, but alas all good things must come to an end. Before I go though, I would just like to thank each and every one of you for taking the time to read, giving me your thoughts and joining in on my inane little polls and requests. You're the real MVP's. It's been an interesting experience and I'm glad I did it. It gave me a sense of achievement, a creative outlet, my wpm has improved drastically, seriously my fingers have never felt stronger. Need to get that on the CV. All joking aside though I've had fun and just because I thought, "I could totally do that." I ended up meeting two of the most awesome people I know, it's funny how the world works, but I'm glad it does. So if you're thinking you could do it, you absolutely could. Give it a shot, it's actually pretty fun. If you're thinking you couldn't do it, well yeah, maybe it'll be a complete crock of shit, but maybe it won't be and the world will work.**

 **I'm sure that for some of you there will be unanswered questions in the chapter. Remember that I tried to keep it as true to the style of the show as I could so I wanted to ensure that you were all left a little confused, disappointed and with an overall sense of being rushed. Please direct any questions to my team. I'm sorry about the 30,000 mistakes that are in the chapter by the way, I know they're there somewhere I just can't bloody see them.**

 **I wish every single one of you all the best, have a great life :)**


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